


Your Friendly Neighborhood Spiderman

by CherryMaybank



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Outer Banks (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fanfic, Fanfiction, Fic, JJ - Freeform, Marvel - Freeform, OBX, Outer Banks, Outer Banks AU, Rudy pankow, Self Insert, Spiderman AU, YFNS fic, jj maybank - Freeform, jj maybank fanfic, jj maybank fanfiction, jj maybank fic, jj maybank series, jj maybank x reader - Freeform, jj x reader - Freeform, marvel AU, obx fanfic, obx fanfiction, obx fic, obx netflix, outer banks fanfic, outer banks fanfiction, outer banks fic, spiderman - Freeform, x Reader
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:48:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 11
Words: 23,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25063402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CherryMaybank/pseuds/CherryMaybank
Summary: Being best friends with JJ Maybank is no cake walk. His reputation of irresponsibility and recklessness makes him a permanent 'trouble student' at Queens High, but what happens when the City's hero and subject of your documentary comes between yours and JJ's relationships? Will you ever be able to thank him enough?
Relationships: JJ (Outer Banks)/Reader, Kiara & Pope (Outer Banks), Sarah Cameron/John B. Routledge
Comments: 1
Kudos: 32





	1. The Defamation of Ozzy's

**Author's Note:**

> This first chapter is trash, but I promise it does get better. My quality of writing has grown a lot and this chapter is arguably the weakest. Other than that, I'm very excited for this series to lift off and develop. I post primarily on Tumblr, but this site allows me to keep the fic more organized which is why I want to post it here.  
> Enjoy YFNS and comment any critiques or praises you want to!

“Last night in Queens, the small twenty-four hour eatery, Ozzy’s Diner, was nearly robbed by three men, who were foiled in their plans thanks to our friendly neighborhood Spiderman,” I read aloud the news article displayed on Kie’s phone through the viewfinder of my camcorder. “Can you believe Ozzy’s was almost robbed last night? We were literally there a few hours before this happened, what if they came while we were there-? We could’ve met Spiderman!”   
“I didn’t even think of that,” Kie realizes in disbelief. As I focus my camera on her excited expression, JJ slides onto the bench across the table from the two of us. Pope greets him with a nod whilst biting into his PB & J.  
“JJ, did you see Spiderman saved Ozzy’s last night? Like, four hours after we were there!” JJ's smile visibly falters through the lens of my camcorder. “What’s up with you? You don’t like Spiderman?” I tease, zooming in on his blank look until his face fills the entire frame.   
“No, Spiderman is cool, it’s just… That’s so crazy... how we were just there... is all,” he says awkwardly. I take his mood as a cue to lower my camera and shut the device off completely.   
“Everything okay?”   
“Fuckin’ fantastic,” he perks up from 0-100 in response. Kie and I share a quick glance which doesn’t go unnoticed by Pope.   
“Okay… Well, for film, I’m thinking of doing a Spiderman exposè, and I was wondering if I could use your guys’ voices for the narration portion? I’m almost done scripting, but I figured it’s better to ask sooner than later?” I take a bite of my food whilst hopefully looking between my friends.   
“I can’t. I’m booked until my ACT this weekend,” Pope shoots me an apologetic look.  
“Yesterday was my only day off, my parents have me dishwashing for the rest of the week,” Kiara declines. I playfully roll my eyes at the pair before dramatically turning to JJ, who is staring into his tray of orange chicken and rice.   
“JJ?”   
“Pass.”   
“Come on! I’ve already asked Sarah and John B and they said no, too. I’m running out of friends, Gnomeo!” I beg, reaching across the table to grab his left forearm with both of my hands. Using his joke nickname from middle school always seems to change his mind. JJ exaggerates a sigh before wriggling his arm out of my grasp, and he flings his fork into the pile of rice before pointing his index finger at my face, the offending elbow resting on the metal tabletop. Staring at me from the opposite end of his hand, his signature smirk returns and he says,  
“Fine... but you have to pay me.”   
“Pay you?! Having a credit in a Y/n Y/l/n original film should be payment enough, you greedy whore”, I swat his hand, which has morphed from an accusatory point to a finger gun, away from my face. His eyes form an unbreakable bond with my own as his smirk brightens into a hearty laugh.  
“If I’m a whore it’s only ‘cause you pimped me out!” I return the finger gun gesture.  
“And you should be grateful. I can pay you in snacks but that’s about it, deal?” I extend the rest of my fingers for a handshake. JJ claps our hands together and we shake once before sliding out into a fist bump. He smiles at me sweetly, keeping his fist against mine for a moment. The longer his touch lingers on the electrified nerves of my skin, the brighter the sparks burn inside my stomach.  
“It’s a deal, Juliet.” All too soon the moment ends and he’s back to picking at his orange chicken. My face doesn’t waiver. I’m grinning like an idiot even though he’s no longer looking at me. “Kie, you gonna finish that?”  
__________________________  
Immediately after the front door closes behind me, I grab a shower and put on my favorite pair of leggings and a blue-grey sweatshirt I stole from JJ many moons ago. I need to steal a different one to replace the scent--his scent--that fades with every wear.   
As I plop down onto my bed, I open my laptop knowing it’ll take a few minutes to boot up. After ten long years, it’s barely alive. Poor bastard. Whilst mentally eulogizing my computer, my phone ignites and vibrates with a text from Kie.

KieKie Palmer: Not actually working tonight. Just figured you and JJ should talk.  
Y/n/n: You are unbelievable,, and talk about what  
KieKie Palmer: Your insanely obvious mutual feelings, duh. Watching him basically eye-fuck you everyday at lunch makes it SO obvious he likes you back  
Y/n/n: Even if I wanted to tell him how I feel it’s not like I could,, I mean he’s not even here yet  
KieKie Palmer: Huh??? I texted him like two minutes ago and he said he was with you?  
Y/n/n: Deadass?   
KieKie Palmer: Attachment: 1 Image  
Y/n/n: Damn.  
No he’s not here yet why would he lie about that?

MESSAGES:  
Gnomeo 💙: yo im stuck on the subway and idek when we r gunna start moving again lets just do it tmrw

Y/n/n: So update he’s stuck on the subway??  
KieKie Palmer: Why is he on the subway you both live in Queens  
Y/n/n: It’s whatever. I don’t wanna pry bc it might be something with his dad again ya know? I’ll just go to Ozzy’s and finish scripting tonight ig  
KieKie Palmer: Want some company?   
Y/n/n: Nah it’s chill thanks tho  
KieKie Palmer: Sure thing babe. Don’t get robbed, I’ll see ya tomorrow!  
Y/n/n: Can do

It’s not unlike JJ to lie but I can’t help but feel like it’s personal. What if he doesn’t like me back? Does he not want to be around me? What if I ruined our friendship for good? No, I’m sure it’s okay. JJ... just needs space sometimes. Yeah, that’s it. Everything is fine.   
True to my word, I pack up my laptop, charger, and camcorder and head down to Ozzy’s to burn the 7 PM oil.  
__________________________  
“Hey! Your usual spot?” Jennifer, the graveyard shift waitress and part-time grad student, greets me at the entrance of the diner.   
“Hey, yeah the booth is fine thanks,” Whenever I come to the diner to work, she always saves me the booth in the large window that has an outlet running into the floor so I can edit or storyboard as I please. It’s a small gesture, but it always makes my day.  
“How many cups should I grab?” Jennifer asks, setting a bundle of silverware in front of me.  
“It’s just me tonight, and could I get decaf?”  
“Right on, doll!” Jennifer gives me hope that college won’t be as soul sucking as everyone makes it seem. She’s studying musical theater, so her experience is far from typical, but she’s taken a few film classes here and there and always has great advice for whatever it is I’m struggling with.   
I have film, Pope has academia, John B has surfing, Sarah has sailing, Kie has cooking, and JJ… Well JJ’s got enough to deal with as it is, he doesn’t need an extra curricular to use up his time.   
Come to think of it JJ seems to have a lot of free time but he’s always busy somehow? How does that work?   
I try to keep my mind off of what his home life is like. I only know what he’s willing to tell me, but I’m sure there’s a lot more abuse that's below the surface. I’m absolutely sure of it.   
I can’t imagine the emotions welling up inside of him every time his dad beats him. I’m honestly worried he’ll snap at any moment. And god only knows what JJ’s capable of.   
I rub my eyes in a good faith attempt at keeping myself awake. Maybe I shouldn’t have asked for decaf after all. Should I just call it a night? With my eyes still adjusting, I blindly tap the screen of my phone and it jumps to life to show my lockscreen: a picture where JJ is squishing my face in his right hand and I’m screaming in disgust as he licks my cheek. Above our heads, the time reads 9:30 PM and I decide I need to go home.   
Mom is off soon, I should take her some food.   
“Hey, Jennifer?”  
__________________________  
My backpack feels heavier and heavier with every step I take to get home. My camcorder is strapped to my right hand and mom’s takeout bag is in my left.   
“As you can see, Queens, New York has fuck-all to offer at 9:43 PM,” I sigh. “Can you even see anything? I feel like it’s too dark out,” after stopping the recording, I flip through the menu to change the brightness,  
“Holy shit this thing has night vis-”  
“Did you bring a knife to a fist fight? Or did I bring fists to a knife fight? One of us must’ve severely misread the invitation,” CLANG.   
“What the fuck?” I whisper, slowly creeping around the corner of an abandoned laundromat. Behind the disintegrating grey paint, the source of the noise is revealed to be two figures, one a blob of black fabric and the other a blur of red and blue.   
No fucking way.   
Lifting my camera to eye level, the night vision feature reveals Spiderman fighting some textbook alleyway mugger. Their combat is all a blur.   
Shock overtakes my body and I can feel my breathing begin to quicken. I shake my head to recenter my vision and when I look back, Spiderman has the mugger webbed against the wall. The guy pathetically struggles against the webs to no avail.   
“Guess I brought webs to a knife fight,” Spiderman says, stepping forward and picking up the mugger’s switchblade. “I’m gonna hold on to this for the time being. That is, if you don’t mind?”   
The mugger opens his mouth to no doubt spew profanities at the hero, but Spiderman is quick to web the perpetrator’s mouth shut. “Didn’t think so.” He begins to walk away, but stops before rounding the corner, “Those’ll dissolve in, uh… three hours give or take? Let’s just hope the boys in blue don’t get to you first, huh?” Spiderman gives his final jab before exiting the alleyway. His eyes are fixed on the struggling man which leads him to slam into my frozen figure. He lets out a scream that probably sits in the the octave of a first soprano's higher register.   
“Holy shit bro you scared the fuck out of me!”  
“Ohmygosh I’msosorry Iwasn’tpayingattention,” I word vomit in a fit of anxiety. Spiderman seems to have absorbed some of my anxiety and begins flailing his hands trying to calm me down.  
“No no no, it’s okay, it’s totally okay, calm down, it’s fine, I promise!” My breathing is sporadic and disturbed, but it slowly begins to even out. Holy shit. Spiderman is standing right in front of me. Spiderman is standing right in front of me and I’m making a documentary about him!   
“I’m Y/n,” I say in a quick exhale.   
“Y/n... that’s cute,” wow, Spiderman thinks my name is cute. “Can I borrow your phone, Y/n? I wanna make sure this guy is... taken care of.”  
“Yeah, uh, sure…” I stammer. Swinging my bag off of my shoulder, I set my camcorder inside and pull out my phone. The movement illuminates my lockscreen as I adjust my bag back onto my shoulder.   
“Who’s that?” Spiderman asks, taking notice of my selfie with JJ.  
“Oh, that’s me and my best friend JJ. We were out on the beach with the rest of our friend group, but I didn’t feel like swimming so he sat with me on the sand the whole day,” I recall the memory with a small smile.   
“Ooooh, are you blushing? Is JJ more than a friend?” he nudges my side as I hand over my unlocked phone.  
“No, no we’re... just friends…” When I hear he isn’t dialing any numbers, I turn to see what’s taking so long. “What?”  
“I’m not very convinced,” Spiderman teases before finally averting his attention to the keypad in his hand.   
“You don’t know anything about me and JJ,” I playfully brush him off.  
“I bet I know more than you think.”  
“Is that so?”  
“Well, I just mean I know how guys think when they’re crushing, is all,” he offers gently.  
“You think JJ could be crushing?” I ask as if he knew anything about what JJ might feel toward me.  
“With a picture like this,” he holds up my phone, “it’s way more likely than you think.”  
“Do you think I should tell him how I feel-”  
“Yes! I mean, uh, yeah, you should go for it,” Spiderman scales back his enthusiasm by a factor of 10 after starting at 100.  
“I’m scared he won’t feel the same, but... I guess you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take, right?” I half smile to feign any sort of optimism. What the hell am I doing? Confessing my feelings for JJ to freaking Spiderman?   
“I think you’ll be happy you went for it, no matter the outcome.”  
“I think you’re right.”


	2. Jailbirds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: JJ has been acting kind of weird lately. First he was spacey during the entire lunch period yesterday, then he lies to both you and Kie about god knows what, and despite JJ’s strange behavior, Spiderman is telling you to shoot your shot?

The a soul-diminishing rhythm embedded in every cellphone’s default ringtone is a cruel reminder that you’ve gotta face the day regardless of whatever happened the night before.  
The night before.  
I can’t believe I met Spiderman. I’m not entirely convinced that I wasn’t dreaming. And he used my phone! Talking to him once gives me, like, a one in a gazillion chance of that ever happening again, right? Is that how probability works? I mean I could’ve asked to interview him for the film but I didn’t, dammit Y/n.  
My frustration strings me along into the bathroom to begin my morning routine. Some cool tiles beneath my feet, and a howling air vent above my head work in tandem to reinstate the loneliness of living here when mom works doubles. At least I now have a cool story to tell the pogues. It’d be a cooler story if I actually had hard evidence, but beggars can’t be choosers. But losers can be losers.  
My own personal cloud of mint toothpaste and hair product fumes attack my sinuses as I dejectedly look into the mirror. Dark circles. Excess skin. Acne. I miss being a kid, and the days where life’s greatest stressors were spelling tests and being the line leader, not how others might perceive my appearance or the existential dread of college decisions. Life was simple. Of course, I didn’t have the same friends back then. The Pogues make high school worth enduring with their deep fried memes and late night diner dates. I wouldn’t trade their friendship for anything, much less getting rid of my own insecurities.  
I'm abruptly grounded me back in the cold studio apartment thanks to the staccato vibrations of my phone. 

MESSAGES:  
Pope Francis: Attachment: 1 Image  
Johnathan Beatrice: Is that just a straight up clementine on its own subway seat  
Pope Francis: Yessir  
KieKie Palmer: 👁👄👁  
Y/n/n: Did you put it there and if so when is your gallery opening at the Met?  
Pope Francis: Nah he was already here when I got on  
KieKie Palmer laughed at “Did you put it there and if so when is your gallery opening at the Met?”  
Johnathan Beatrice laughed at “Did you put it there and if so when is your gallery opening at the Met?”  
Y/n/n: SIGH  
Y/n/n: If only someone didn’t have a Samsung. this could be a fully functioning group chat 😪  
JJ: dude shut the fuck up ur literly my left foot  
Y/n/n: Sorry, I don’t speak broke  
Pope Francis: Attachment: 1 Image  
Pope Francis: NOOOOO MY ORANGE FRIEND ROLLED TO THE BACK OF THE CAR  
KieKie Palmer: Y’all are ridiculous  
Y/n/n: Speaking of ridiculous get to school asap I have a story I wanna tell you guys in person  
___________________________  
“I’m not kidding! He was deadass fighting this dude who I guess was trying to mug him- which is funny because it doesn’t really seem like Spiderman carries anything with him when he fights,” I gush to the pogues about my run in with the arachnid vigilante.  
“So you just ran into him while he was fighting a criminal?” John B asks whilst tucking his hands into the pockets of his denim jacket.  
“Who’s fighting criminals?” Over my left shoulder, I turn to see JJ as he approaches our circle from behind me. He slings both of his arms around the top of my shoulders, crushing my backpack with his torso, his eyebrows scrunched in confusion. He looks exhausted. The bags under his eyes make his sleepless night apparent, and his usually styled blonde hair is the most disheveled and greasy I’ve ever seen. He definitely looks rougher than normal, but the sad thing is it’s not the worst I’ve seen.  
“Bro you look like a hedgehog,” Sarah’s observation makes me laugh, much to JJ's dismay. Under her comment I interlace our fingers and delicately pull up his jacket sleeve. JJ doesn’t think twice and reads the gesture as a form of affection.  
...I’m really checking for bruises.  
“I ran into Spiderman last night on my way home from Ozzy’s,” I reply to his prior question.  
“You went to Ozzy’s last night?”  
“Yeah, I figured I’d work there since you texted me saying you were stuck on the subway,” JJ keeps his arms around my shoulders and I can physically feel him tense up.  
“You were stuck on the subway? For how long?” John B asks, “I feel like that’s something we would’ve heard about.”  
“Which train was it, JJ?” Pope asks, pulling out his phone to load Safari.  
“Doesn’t matter. I’m fine now, so you guys don’t need to worry about what train broke down.”  
“Which train broke down,” I corrected.  
“Nothing turns me on more than correct grammar,” JJ fake moans. Even sleep deprived JJ is sharp as a tack; that’s one of the things I love most about him.  
“She wouldn’t have to correct you if you had just signed up for AP with us,” Kie jumps in to my defense.  
“Whatever. Mr. Hedley is a god, we played bingo yesterday while you nerds had to write essays so suck on that.”  
“Some of us need to write essays for college credit,” adds Sarah as she takes a sip of her ice coffee.  
“You got iced coffee, in Queens, in November?” I ask shivering under my denim jacket that shells over my school sweatshirt.  
“Can I have some?” I look at JJ in disbelief. Sarah hands over her iced coffee to place it in his bare hand.  
“Where are your rings?” I interrogate the madman, inspecting his now un-accessorized fingers.  
“I guess I forgot to put them back on after showering,” he shrugs at me from behind the carmel, doubleshot blonde americano. JJ lifts the drink to his lips, and chugs a good two-thirds of the cup. Once finished, he wipes his mouth with the back of his free, left hand and extends his right, back to Sarah.  
“I’m too shocked to be mad, how the fuck did you chug all of my drink?”  
“You’re insane” Pope laughs.  
__________________________  
First, second, and third period passed by faster than anticipated, I think on my walk to my locker before fourth. I don’t need anything inside so I pull out my phone to check the time, and lean my shoulder against the metal complex as I wait for JJ. 6 minutes left in the passing period.  
“Hey.” My head snaps up to see JJ leaning against the locker next to mine, mirroring my stance and posture identically. The only differences being he has to crane his neck down to be eye level with me, and the infamous JJ smirk is plastered across his face while my expression is neutral.  
“Hi,” I smile. He nods away from the lockers and pushes off with his shoulder, and I follow his lead. Falling into step with one another, we make our way to physics. I’m 90% sure he only took honors in hopes of having another class together. It worked, the lucky bastard.  
“What happened during your spider-man encounter last night?” JJ asks, playfully veering into my side to throw me off balance. Laughing, I shove him back harder but he barely even leans. Huh.  
“I was walking home after ordering dinner for mom-’cause she was working late again-and he was just there, in an alleyway, fighting this dude who had a switchblade. Then he, like, webbed the guy to the wall and on his way to find a payphone we ran into each other-literally he bodied me because I was too surprised to move-and he wasn’t looking where he was going... And then, he asked to use my phone to get the guy picked up, and he commented on my lockscreen…” I trail off sheepishly. JJ’s smirk is gone but he’s still intently listening.  
“What- uhm, what did he say about the lockscreen?” he asks nonchalantly.  
“It’s still the picture of us at the beach, and he asked if we were... more than friends- and I told him no but he didn’t seem very convinced.”  
“Did he say anything else?” JJ pushes as he tucks his hands into his jacket pockets.  
“Uh, not really. He just said that we looked cute- or happy I guess.”  
“Did he tell you to do anything?” he’s staring at the floor when he asks, seemingly avoiding eye contact. His questions are odd, like he’s trying to get a specific answer out of me. Like he knows what Spiderman told me last night. What if JJ knows Spiderman?  
“No, he did not… why do you ask?”  
“No reason,” he shrugs quickly, “no reason at all.”  
“You know, repeating yourself isn’t very convincing,” I tease before he finally looks at me completely. JJ opens his mouth to reply but is quickly cut off by Mr. Osborn.  
“If you both could sit down quickly, we have a lot to get through today,” he snaps, already sounding frustrated.  
“Yes sir,” JJ stands at attention and salutes Mr. Osborn mockingly. His joke is not received politely but he doesn’t seem to care. We both enter the room and find our seats on the left of the classroom. Mr. Osborn pretends his seating charts are computer generated and random, but it’s obvious he pairs the smart kids with the ‘trouble students’, which is how I ended up with JJ. 

The bell rings over the soft chatter of the room, and Mr. Osborn steps in front of the promethean board. He begins his dull lecture before I can open to my last page of notes. Something about force? I'm scrambling to keep up. Fuck this class, and fuck Mr. Osborn's inconsiderate headassery.  
“Mr. Maybank you should be taking notes,” my head snaps up to see Mr. Osborn staring right at our desk. He makes brief, irritated eye contact with me before looking back to JJ. JJ’s slouching against the back of his plastic blue seat, toying with my eraser that I didn’t notice he had grabbed. Klepto-stealth 100.  
JJ lets out a long and uninterested sigh. Then he rolls his head sideways to look at me.  
“Do you have paper?” I let out a small laugh at his lack of preparedness, and JJ’s uninterested expression disappears as he smiles back. Flipping to the back of my notebook, I tear out a page for him to use. Setting the sheet on the table, I move it in front of him because he’s busy fishing for a pencil in his backpack. Mr. Osborn resumes his lecture about centripetal force and JJ finally locates a cheap, lime green mechanical pencil he no doubt stole from another classroom. I go back to note taking but I’m distracted by a small noise coming from next to me. JJ is rapidly clicking the pencil to no avail as the pencil is empty.  
“Do you have lead?” he whispers. Mr. Osborn whips around,  
“Are you talking while I’m giving my lecture? I will not tolerate your interruptions any longer, JJ. You will be spending after school, with me, in this room, to make up for the lost time,” he snaps aggressively as he heads to his desk to write a detention slip.  
“He wasn’t talking, he was just asking for-”  
“You can join him, Ms. Y/l/n.”  
Are you fucking kidding me?  
Why is Mr. Osborn such a dick?! My anger and frustration warp into one emotion, and the overwhelming sensation shortens my breathing. Involuntary tears well up in my eyes as I sit, silenced by my own rage. Mr. Osborn quickly walks to our desk and places the slips in front of us, before huffing back to the whiteboard to finish his stupid lecture. I’m too stunned to continue to take notes, and my mini panic attack numbs me into nothingness. JJ is unphased by all kinds of punishment, but I’m not. I’m not the troubled student. Ever. What if this goes on my permanent record? Will admission officers think I’m a bad student?  
JJ can sense my erratic thinking and sets down his green pencil. He puts one arm around the back of my chair and uses the other to grab my head and pull it under his. After a moment, he squeezes the side of my face into his chest and places a small kiss on top of my head. His touch is gone as quickly as it came, but it had grounded me once again.  
Why is Mr. Osborn such a dick?!


	3. JJ Maybank is MIA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: The pogues know all about how Spiderman held your phone, but they don’t know about how he tried to wingman you on impulse. JJ is still acting weird but functioning as normal. So normal he managed to land himself in detention. Now you’ve got detention too, and if this goes on your permanent record colleges will see you were punished for ‘hate speech’ seeing as that’s what osborn wrote on the detention slip. Fuck physics. And fuck mr. osborn.

Snap peas, a protein bar, and a bag of goldfish, none of which I remember packing this morning, lay untouched on the beige plastic surface in front of me.  
“I’m so mad” I declare, sitting on the bench between JJ and John B, slapping the pink detention slip onto the table and sliding it towards Kie.  
“You got detention for hate speech?” she asks looking between my exasperated expression and the offending paper. To my right, JJ is stifling a snickering laugh.  
Unbelievable.  
“What are you laughing at? I wouldn’t have detention if it weren’t for you and your inability to prepare!” I raise my voice in frustration. JJ’s grin morphs into a small but hearty laugh in response . His laugh is the best sound in the world, it’s contagious and it’s special and it’s endearing.  
“You got hate speech, but on mine he wrote ‘potential terrorist threat’.” At that, the entire table bursts into full-on laughter.  
“What the fuck did you guys even do?” John B asks between laughs.  
“JJ wasn’t taking notes and Osborn yelled at him for it, so then he asks me for paper and everything is fine but then his pencil didn’t have lead so he asks me for lead but Osborn thought he was just talking to be talking in the middle of his precious lecture so he gets detention. Then I stick my neck out for him and try and explain that he was asking for lead but Osborn wouldn’t fucking listen and now colleges are gonna think I use racial slurs or something!” The group is still laughing at JJ’s and my new terrorist status. However, the laughter is short lived; it quickly morphs into a group rage bonding.  
“When I had him in freshman year, he called my dad saying that I openly disrespected him in class, all because I forgot my textbook that day,” Pope says while he shakes his head, annoyed.  
“Osborn is the fucking worst. Like, how can you be an advanced physics teacher if you don’t even believe in climate change?” Kie adds spooning a bite of orange rice into her mouth.  
“Well thanks for nothing guys, now he’s gonna be in a bad mood for our classes,” John B advocates for himself and Sarah, “You’d think that the later the class, the more he’d back off from being a dick but no! The first period students were pure evil and that means the sixth period ones are too!”  
“Is ‘hate speech’ gonna be on my permanent record?” tiny slivers of hope find themselves laced into every word I say. Slowly, everyone begins to pack up their things in anticipation of the passing period bell for 5th.  
“I wouldn’t be too worried about it. Our graduating class has the highest incarceration rate of the whole school, there are worse things you could do,” Kie calmly waves her spoon in my direction.  
“I mean… I guess so…”  
__________________________  
MESSAGES:  
Y/n/n: I’m already outside of Osborn’s. I don’t wanna go in alone the door is closed  
Y/n/n: Hello??

MESSAGES:  
Y/n/n: You’ll never fucking believe who isn’t here  
KieKie Palmer: Are you serious?  
Y/n/n: JJ is the entire reason I even have detention today and he’s not even here!!  
Y/n/n: The door is closed and I have no idea why I rlly dont wanna be alone with Osborn for two hours  
KieKie Palmer: I’m sure he’s just trying to keep the temperature regulated. As for JJ I have no clue.  
Y/n/n: wiufwenbcoijdc  
KieKie Palmer: You’ll be okay. Do you want me to come with you lol  
Y/n/n: Nah I’ll be fine  
Y/n/n: Go secure that waitressing bag  
KieKie Palmer: Will do chief

Everything will be alright.  
I inhale on 7 counts, hold for 5, and exhale for 10 to soothe my nerves. I read that helps with anxiety in a JAMA article once, I think? I can’t remember. Here goes the next two hours. Alone. With Osborn.  
I use my entire body weight to lean back and pull the steel door open, stepping into the air conditioned science lab. I see that the only light on is the one in the back of the classroom. The front is completely dark with only the projector playing... an episode of Mad Men?  
Glancing across the Promethean board I see Mrs. Kasmos, my AP English Language teacher, sitting in the front row watching the show intently. She’s sitting on the edge of her seat, consumed by the story. When she notices me in the doorway, she politely hops up and moves to pause the show.  
“Oh, hey Y/n.”  
“What are you doing here?” I ask bewildered at her presence.  
“I’m here to step in for Mr. Osborn’s detention session today. Did you come here for tutoring?”  
“No. I’m the… deten-ded student you’re watching. He didn’t mention?”  
“He left me a list of the two students that I’d be watching over but I didn’t read it. Either they’d show or they wouldn’t and it seems you did,” she replies calmly, comfortably. How often do teachers ask their coworkers to babysit like this?  
“Did he say where he was going?”  
“He just said it was an emergency and he had to leave as soon as I could get here. He’s lucky 6th period is my prep,” Mrs. Kasmos’s voice is confident yet comforting; everything smaller detail about her adds a little edge to her generally soothing nature. Like how her hair is an ordinary chestnut brown, but the back has a tribal pattern shaved into it. Or how she doesn’t like to wear flashy jewelry but she has 7 millimeter gauges. She’s the coolest adult I know.  
So cool she instantly senses my mood, “What’s up, kid?”  
“Nothing much, I guess I’m in sort of a weird place… mentally.”  
“You wanna talk about it?” I hesitate for a moment.  
Should I unload all of my feelings to her? I guess I haven’t really talked to anyone about this yet...  
“It’s a lot…” I trail off, dumping my backpack onto the closest table.  
“I’ve got time and I assume you do too.”  
“Right. Well, do you know my friend JJ? He’s blonde and-”  
“He walks you to class everyday?”  
“Yeah,” a sheepish grin takes form on my face as I commend her keen observational skills. “So he’s been acting kind of weird-? I don’t know he’s just been a lot quieter than normal which, I’m sure you’ve seen the way he acts, he’s crazy,” I laugh, “and him being quiet worries me sometimes because…” I can’t let her know about his dad.  
“He fights with his dad sometimes because his dad has a short temper- but they always make up.”  
“So you’re worried the fighting might be getting out of hand?”  
“No, no. I’m just worried that maybe he’s going through something that he feels I can’t help him with… if that makes sense?”  
“Yeah, I get you. Has it been something you’ve seen with him and other friends or is it something between just you two?”  
“Huh. I guess just us two,” I say realizing what she’s getting at.  
“What’s been going on with you two?”  
“The other day we were supposed to meet to film for this documentary I’m making and he just completely bailed and said he got stuck on the subway, but the next morning my friends all checked and there wasn’t a train that broke down that night which was kind of weird. Then he asked some weird questions about what I should ‘do’- oh yeah I met Spiderman the other night- and JJ asked me if Spiderman told me to ‘do’ anything,” I feel like I’m rambling nonsense but Mrs. Kasmos seems invested in what I'm trying to say, so I continue.  
“And this morning he seems super exhausted and way out of it like he hadn’t slept. And he usually has these bruises… which-he-doesn’t-even-know-where-they-come-from-he-just-bruises-like-a-peach...” I word vomit to conceal any trace of familial problems.  
“But he’s always got bruises and then today there was nothing. Not a single one- which is crazy because he hit his arm, like, yesterday before lunch, and then… this is gonna sound crazy,” shying away from my next comment, I card a hand through my tangled hair.  
“Try me,” she offers with a straight face.  
“He seems… stronger? Maybe not ‘stronger’. I don’t know if that makes any sense, it probably doesn’t.”  
“Well, what do you mean by stronger?”  
“Like physically, he’s always pretty gentle with me and we’ll just give playful shoves or nudges, but earlier he nudged me and I almost fell completely over but he didn’t even seem to have notice that he had pushed me that hard, which makes me think he doesn’t know that he’s stronger?” I finished with a confused expression. Mrs. Kasmos takes a brief moment to collect her thoughts before sitting up straighter in her seat.  
“Well a lot of this sounds pretty typical of teenage boys.”  
“It does?”  
“Yeah. Do you have brothers?”  
“I just live with my mom.”  
“Well I grew up with two of them and let me tell you just how unfair life is,” she leans forward as if she’s about to tell me the Pentagon’s security clearance. “For girls, puberty is sad and lonely and miserable, but for them? It’s just the miracle of ejaculation and overactive hair follicles.” I laugh at her description.  
“That’s so not fair!… but I guess if it seems like pretty standard puberty stuff... then I don’t really need to be worried?”  
“From what I’ve seen and heard that kid is pretty self-sufficient. I wouldn’t be too worried,” she reassures me. As I continue to talk she exits the Mad Men screen to log out of her computer.  
“I can’t help the worrying a lot of the time... I really care about him,” my tongue darts out to moisten my lips but I catch myself in the bad habit and reach for my lip balm in my backpack.  
“Do you care about him as more than a friend? Possibly?”  
Do I?  
I can’t like JJ. That would ruin everything. It would make things awkward between us, tear the pogues apart, not to mention the awkwardness of going to mutual hangouts.  
“I guess I’ve never really thought of it that way?”  
“Do you think he cares about you as more than a friend?” Mrs. Kasmos says in a curious tone. I figured she would ask prompting questions that would allow me to psychoanalyze myself. She's really good at it, too.  
“Maybe?”  
“Think about any crushes or attractions he’s had in the past. Does that behavior parallel how he’s been acting with you lately?”  
“It’s hard to tell. I mean he’s such a flirty person in general, I can’t always tell what’s just him and what’s the real ‘flirting’ him. I can only see when he’s hitting on someone else really,” when I finished, she crosses her arms and leans forward on the grey desk between us,  
“Maybe you could just look at your interactions through that lens from now on. Just to see if that may be the case.”  
“Yeah, maybe... Thank you for letting me rant, and I’m sorry I’m the reason you have to stay til 5:30,” I say sincerely. Mrs. Kasmos laughs in my face,  
“Hah! No. Don’t be sorry. I’m not staying til 5:30, and neither are you. Go home, be with your mom, enjoy your evening.” Then she slides off of the rolling chair she’s in, and slips the computer into her black North Face backpack.  
“I’ve gotta turn all the lights off and lock up, so don’t wait for me.” And with that I grab my backpack as she shoo’s me out the door. Anything is better than spending another minute is Osborn's lair.  
__________________________  
My room is extremely stuffy since the A/C unit broke a few days ago, which means I’m stuck in the 'opening and closing of the window' hell. I press pause on the Harry Styles tik tok compilation emitting from my laptop, and roll off of my bed to stumble towards the window; my vision temporarily leaves me. Wow, I am de-hydrated.  
Shoving the rusted pin out from it’s equally deteriorated latch allows me to lift the window open ¾ of the way. I’m met with the sounds of airplanes and commuters and sirens and homeless men on crack. The ambient noise of life being lived can drive some people out of the city, but to me, it’s home. Looking out the window, I see a wilted succulent that sits abandoned on the fire escape. It must've been abandoned a few months ago once I realized I don't want to be a minimalist millennial.  
Running to my closet, I put on my favorite sneakers before stepping back out of the window, and onto the metal grate. I crouch down and look closer at the plant. It looks as dehydrated as I am, and I offer my condolences.  
Wait. Mrs. Aldony from next door keeps a garden on the roof. Maybe if I just leave the plant up there she’ll revive it. Brilliant idea, Y/n.  
I grab the plant in my left hand and use my right to help me scale the narrow stairs of the escape.  
I live two floors below the rooftop, so the climb is quick and easy with a potted plant.  
The roof is made of concrete and there’s no greenery in sight. Just A/C vents.  
Then, I see it. In the far right corner from my fire escape entrance, a small bed of tomatoes and morning glories thrive between the crown of the roof and the entryway from the main stairwell. I jog over in excitement and place the little plant on the ground next to the garden bed, right where she'll see it upon entry.  
“Farewell little plant. May you rest in the care of poor old Mrs. Aldony,” I give the wilting shrub a two finger salute.  
As I turn to leave I look up from the concrete floor that’s hosting the succulent, out onto the horizon to see the beginning to set. Golden hour is overrated, but just this once I take in it’s beauty without indignation.  
On the building across from mine I see a figure, shrouded in the golden rays. The blue and red shape is standing exactly across from me on the building that parallels mine.  
I wouldn’t have seen him before because I had my back to it. But now, as plain as day, Spiderman stands one building away, frozen, like me. He’s looking directly at me. The white ovals of his mask centered on my isolated figure.  
After an eternal moment of staring at one another, he jumps off of the building, shooting a web to swing past the apartment complex adjacent to the one he was standing on. His body weight carries him forward, hands thwipping rapidly despite his calm demeanor, and just like that, Spiderman is gone with the sun.


	4. Under Pressure

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: Your detention slip and now permanent record may both read ‘abuser of hate speech’; on top of that JJ ditched the detention that you were meant to spend together. With mom working late, it’s easy to buckle down and finish homework, until that neglected plant on the fire escape distracts you from the task at hand. In hopes of revitalising the creature, you took a trip to your apartment’s rooftop only to find Spiderman had been watching your every move. Just like JJ, he ducked out of the scene without a trace.

MESSAGES:  
Y/n/n: I’m already outside of Osborn’s. I don’t wanna go in alone the door is closed  
Y/n/n: Hello??  
Read 12:18 AM

Still no response. I can’t remember the last time JJ has read a text and not contacted at least one of the pogues. Mrs. Kasmos’s advice on male puberty re enters my head and I can’t help feeling relieved but also disappointed.   
Is this how things are going to be now? I can’t imagine losing JJ, especially over something as simple as the 'bulk of puberty'.  
The various possible explanations for his checking out run through my mind as I walk to school. When I get there, JJ will just explain everything and then we’ll all understand and things will go back to the way they were. I have no reason to be anxious so why should I be anxious?… because that’s how anxiety works. I guess.  
__________________________  
“Who decided our meeting spot would be outside during the winter?” I ask approaching the group as they all greet me with varying degrees of tired, closed-mouth smiles.   
“Y/n, you have to try this,” Pope says, handing me a thick rectangle wrapped in white paper littered with the Hubba Bubba logo.  
“The fuck is this?”   
“It’s Dr. Pepper gum.”  
“Where did you find this?”  
“I found it in the gas station where I got my breakfast burrito,” John B chimes in with his mouth half full.   
“But I just brushed my teeth!”  
“Just eat it!”  
“Okay, okay. This is peer pressure, I’m gonna put you guys in the bullying box,” I say unwrapping the brick of gum. I hesitate to eat it as the entire group is watching me like vultures in anticipation. I place it on my tongue for a moment before deciding to chew the whole piece.  
“Yo, what the fuck?” I say in awe of the confectionary. “How did they do that?” The group laughs at my obvious bewilderment, which causes me to laugh. I unnecessarily chew harder into the gum to figure out the experience I’m having, no doubt making the most ridiculous faces.  
“That’s amazing. Has JJ tried it yet?” I ask before realizing he’s nowhere to be found. “Wait where is JJ?”  
“You tell me, he’d reach out to you before any of us,” Kie says looking amongst the group. Everyone slowly nods in agreement.  
“No way. You’ve been best friends since 3rd grade, I’m sure he’d contact you, John B,” I say, unaware of my own denial.  
“Yeah, but he likes you more.”  
“JJ doesn’t like me more that’s...” I trail off in realization.   
Does JJ like me more? I mean we’ve always sort of been on a different wavelength from everyone else but that doesn’t necessarily mean we’re closer, right? “I mean he read my texts from yesterday at like 12 AM, but he didn’t respond. What do y’all think happened?”  
The group once again expresses a uniform confusion and discomfort.   
“It might’ve just been another run in with his dad... A really bad one,” Pope points out before blowing a bubble from his Dr. Pepper gum. The bubble pulls John B and Sarah from the moment and they begin to talk about the gum, as they had been before I arrived. In the midst of processing my emotions, the noise of the world around me dulls into buzzing vibrations with no meaning or familiarity.   
“Hey,” Kie rests a hand on my bicep which clears my hearing. “I’m sure everything is fine. JJ’s a tough kid, he can take care of himself,” she says softly so as to not draw attention to our sidebar.  
“Yeah. It’s JJ...” I shrug.   
He’s fine. I’m sure of it.  
__________________________  
The monotony of ordinary is deafening here at Queens High. We have a new project in English for narrative writing, and I can’t be bothered to start any time soon; we learned today in APUSH, Abraham Lincoln is still racist and still dead; and I’m really not sure what’s happening in Precalc, because it stopped making sense once we entered the second unit that was no longer review from last year. I wonder how physics will undoubtedly add to the workload. To top it all off, JJ isn’t even here for me to write notes to. I have to suffer in isolated silence.

I remember this one day, when we were learning about projectiles, JJ drew Mr. Osborn as a goat and we had to try and keep quiet, but we were laughing way too hard. He blacklisted us from that day forward, the only difference between me and JJ being I have good grades. JJ is a permanent member of the shitlist since the quality of his homework doesn’t make up for the goofing off we both commit.  
Whatever. I can handle today with or without JJ. Proceeding with an unnecessarily deep breath, I walk into Osborn’s classroom. Everyone in the room is looking at me as I come in, alone. Usually I don’t notice if anyone's staring at me because all I see is JJ. We’ll come in laughing at whatever stupid comment he’s made and take our seats louder than Osborn would prefer. That's how it's always been. Instead, the room is silent today and sparing a quick glance to the front, I see why.   
Osborn is nowhere to be seen.  
Instead it’s Ms. Tolpher, a well known substitute on campus who has a shorter than normal attention span. It’s an odd but very noticeable trait to find in a person. She smiles as she catches my gaze and I offer the fakest, politest smile I can muster, seeing as I can't stop thinking about JJ.  
“Hi everyone, I’m Ms. Tolpher. Your teacher’s only instructions were to ‘finish last night's homework because I know more than half of you didn’t do it’,” she reads off of a piece of white printer paper.   
Wonderful.   
I guess I'll use this time to work on all the assignments I have for my other classes. If I grind now I can be free after school. Past Y/n, the future Y/n thanks you for being responsible yesterday. And I guess thank you JJ for leaving me alone and giving me time to work.  
__________________________  
Running a fork over the full container of salad I brought for lunch today, I realize just how not hungry I am. Seeing a deformed piece of lettuce and reminds me of this one day where I had brought in a salad for lunch, and JJ made fun of me for eating healthy. In response, I pretended to be offended, and we both laughed regardless. Upon opening the container I saw that all the leaves were wilted, the hard boiled egg had gone green, and the croutons were soggy. JJ then said it was instant karma for trying to deny my tastebuds any sort of enjoyment, and with his signature grin, he split his sandwich with me and gave me his vending machine bag of Cheez-It’s.   
“Hey.” My head snaps up as I’m pulled from the memory, and I see Pope waving a hand in front of my face. “You good?”   
I nod rapidly on instinct before realizing: I didn’t want to have a break down in front of the entire cafeteria, and I was probably about to.  
“Yeah, I just need some air,” I say almost inaudibly, standing from the plastic bench and leaving the mess hall. The cool metal of the pushbar causes me to shiver and my desire to be alone grows infinitely larger.   
It’s all becoming too much: the homework, the projects, college plans, JJ is missing, I don’t want to stress out my friends, I haven't seen my mom for more than 10 minutes this week, and-  
“Y/n!”  
I turn back to see Pope followed me out of the cafeteria, and is now jogging to catch up with me. Once he’s standing in front of me, panting, he notices the tears welling up in my eyes. I blink them back down with a sniffle but Pope isn’t so easily fooled.  
“Hey, what’s wrong?”  
“I-” my voice threatens to break underneath me and I pause to take a deep breath to stabilize my emotional state. The last thing I want to do is give him the impression I can't handle my emotions. “I’m just really stressed out right now.” Pope nods in complete understanding. If anyone knows the stress of family issues, school, and friends--it’s Pope. I've offered my support to him before, the least I could do is allow him to return the gesture...  
“Do you want to talk about it?”  
“It’s a lot, I mean school work and my mom and… JJ,” as I finish my sentence Pope tenses up, and his eyes widen slightly. After a moment he responds,  
“Uh. Well, that’s only 3 things?” he offers positively. Pope's eyes sink to the grey speckled tiles on the floor where his converse shoes are shuffling in unrest. I breathe out a small, teary laugh before he continues. “I mean JJ is probably fine. He’s tough and street smart and he knows New York.”  
“...What?”  
“What?”  
“What do you mean he knows New York?”  
“Just in general, so if he’s not at home he’s gonna be okay.” What does that even mean? Brushing a stray strand of hair out of my face, I let out a frustrated sigh.  
“Pope, what the hell are you talking about?”  
“I don’t know! I’m just saying if JJ were out in the city he’d be fine, but I’m sure he’s probably just at home because he’s tired or something,” Pope finishes, flustered. His anxiety increases the more he talks and the waiver in his voice completely gives him away.  
JJ wouldn’t miss school just because he’s tired. He wouldn’t...  
“You’re probably right... I’m just anxious- thanks for all the reassurance Pope.”   
__________________________  
“I’m not gonna waste time shotlisting if I’m just using found footage!” I whisper to myself as I read through the project requirements on my teacher's website. Behind me I hear my friend, An, laugh. “Oh, sorry. I’m just thinking out loud for no reason.”  
“It’s cool,” he says before putting his headphones back on only one ear. His computer screen is frozen on a dutch tilt on someone's eyes, and I can see he's adjusting the color grading on the scene.  
Turning my attention back to my own project, I realize I need my external hard drive to import some footage I downloaded from when I was working at home. Once I've fished the device out of my backpack, I run my hand along the warm metal of the back of the computer to feel for the USB port, and plug in the drive.   
All the footage of Spiderman that I have is all embedded in full length youtube videos from social media news outlets. I’ll be spending a lot of time cropping; I’ll be spending even more time downloading all of these ten minute videos to the dinosaur that our school calls a computer. How are these things even compatible with Premiere?  
I realize importing all of the videos will most likely take the entire class period, so I lean back into my chair to get comfortable. My attention span doesn't hold up, and as a result I turn back towards An to see what he's doing now.  
“What are you working on?” He doesn't verbally reply, but instead offers me his headphones and scrolls back to the beginning of the video to press play. It’s a break from his usual noir films and instead, a spaghetti western complete with Nerf guns. Everything is there: the super close ups, high noon, dust clouds, leather hats, and even tumble weeds! He’s a self described ‘Vietnamese Sergio Leone’ and I think he's very deserving of the title.   
“I like this a lot. Your editing style works really well with westerns,” I say, handing back the headphones. An shyly thanks me and I don't realize his gaze follows mine, back to my own computer. The Spiderman footage is still downloading. My focus diverts to the temporary folder on my desktop. Double clicking the drive that is cleverly entitled 'film', I see a folder called ‘portrait of JJ’.   
How did I forget about this?  
“Who’s that? Is it the guy you’re always with?” I hear An ask from over my shoulder. His observational skills are as sharp as Mrs. Kasmos', which makes me blush.  
“That’s my best friend JJ. This past summer I decided I wanted to make a documentary about him and I’ve been compiling footage of him ever since,” I explain quickly as An surveys the video playing on my desktop. It’s one of JJ and I at the pier with our friends. He’s eating an ice cream cone and is trying to wipe the melted remnants off of his hand, and onto my t-shirt. The audio in my headphones is a mixture of both of our laughter as he tries to catch me, while also making sure he doesn’t drop his remaining ice cream.  
“Now that you mention, I guess we really are always together... except, he’s not at school today… and he hasn’t been answering any of my texts.”  
“Well, you guys seem close.”  
“We are,” I say with a smile and without hesitation.  
“When I met Davey, we were inseparable, too,” he explains with a little less fondness in his eyes. “We met way back in 7th grade math class. When did you and JJ meet?”   
“About a year ago? It was at a back to school party for our friend, you know Sarah Cameron?” An's nod 'yes' prompts me to continue. “She was hosting this back to school party, and we were friends so I was invited, and she invited John B. Routledge because they both had a crush on each other but didn’t think the other did. So by extension, John B. invited JJ to sort of be his hypeman for the night.” An laughs at my exposition. He then turns his body to directly face mine, offering my story his full attention.  
“So John B. and Sarah are already flirting within a few minutes and JJ’s work is done, so he kinda floats around trying to find someone he can flirt with I guess, and he finds me on the couch on my phone because I’m not really huge into parties--but I love Sarah so of course I came.” Quickly, I glance back at my computer screen to check on the downloads.   
26 minutes left.   
“And JJ finds me on my phone and he literally jumps on the couch next to me and that scared me so he was already off to a great start. Then he asks about who I am and all the small talk formalities, and I thought ‘oh gosh he’s gonna start physically flirting with me like touching my shoulder or my face and I really don’t want that’, so I’m mentally preparing for the flirting to start, but then,” the memory makes me laugh to recall.  
“Then he asks me--completely serious: ‘what conspiracy theories do you believe in?’ and I was just so surprised, I really thought he was gonna try and kiss me eventually, but he just wanted to talk about conspiracies the whole night!” I finish breathlessly, looking between my one audience member and the downloading videos on my computer.  
“That’s so funny. What did you say?”  
“Hm?”  
“Which conspiracy theory?”  
“Oh I told him my thoughts on the JonBenét Ramsey situation. I think the brother is the one who killed her, and all the letters and whatnot were written by the parents to help cover up the murder and keep him innocent.” An seems thoroughly surprised by my answer before inputting his own conspirator beliefs,  
“I would’ve said that the government definitely has aliens in Area 51.”


	5. Broken Pieces

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: JJ did read your text, however he’s completely MIA for the whole school day. Pope and Kie pick up on how you’re feeling down now that JJ is gone for unknown reasons. The stress of one problem to another finally causes you to crack under the pressure and though Pope came to your emotional aid, he’s been acting weird. Really weird. There’s no better way to take your mind off of your problems than a good old film class period. An, the greatest film friend and Vietnamese Sergio Leone, can tell just how fond you are of JJ. And for good reason seeing as your meeting story is one in a million: who doesn’t want to talk conspiracy theories with a stranger?

I groan into my hands as I rub my eyes for what feels like the millionth time. This documentary is going to be the death of me. After trimming down all 3,098,567 hours of youtube news, I’m left with a whopping one minute of Spiderman footage.  
What am I gonna do? Do colleges even care about superhero exposés? Is it too late to change my entire project? I could get started on the JJ documentary.  
Opening the file of JJ footage on my hard drive, I see a different clip that I haven’t watched yet. The video, no doubt recorded on my camcorder, is a medium close shot of JJ sitting by the pool at Sarah’s complex. We’ve got our feet in the water and he’s watching Pope from across the pool, who is undoubtedly doing something stupid. But it makes JJ laugh and I smile from behind my computer screen at his expression. Then, he turns to talk to me and sees that I’m recording, which makes him laugh harder and lean forward to make a weird face directly into the lens.  
It makes digital and real life me laugh, and JJ looks up, above the camera lens, at me. He's grinning larger than life, meanwhile I'm so focused on my camera that if I weren't rolling, I'd never have known he looked at me like that. He says something to the lens again, but I miss it due to my computer volume being so low. I hit pause to rewind, scrubbing back to when JJ was smiling and I move to hit play-

Knock knock.

What the hell? Looking up to the time on my computer desktop, the clock reads 12:08 AM. It's not that late, but definitely late enough to be imagining things. Whatever, I’m sure-

Knock knock knock.

Placing my headphones on my desk, I spin around in my seat to face my window. My midnight blue blackout curtain hangs stagnant, muffling the potentially imaginary sound.

BANG BANG BANG BANG

Okay, well, there’s no denying that I'm definitely not having auditory hallucinations. Either that noise is a really large pigeon, a person who scaled the side of my building, or there’s a tennis ball pitching machine that’s set on a very specific rhythm with varying levels of force.  
I slowly push off of my chair. My fingertips hesitantly leave the edge of the seat as if I’ll disappear when I let go. My mind screams freeze or run far away, but my body betrays its wishes and carries me closer to the window. Reaching a shaking hand towards my curtain I grip the edge of the fabric in my clammy fingers.  
I take a deep breath to calm my nerves and, quickly, I yank the curtain to the side, gasping once my eyes focus outside of the window. My eyes are wide. My body frozen in shock. My lungs will only allow shallow breaths as I try and process what’s in front of me.  
“What the fuck,” I whisper mostly to myself. The aged paint of the windowsill typically frames the outside world in a romantic way... except for tonight. Outside my window, like a mirage of blue and red heroism, Spiderman is kneeling on my fire escape, clutching the side of his abdomen.  
Once I begin believing what I’m seeing, I notice there are severe gashes in his suit. Red and blue shreds of fabric peeling off of the piece that was once whole.  
“Please- let me in,” he says desperately. In the mix of shock and adrenaline my skepticism takes control,  
“What do you need in my house for-”  
“PLEASE! Y/n, please. Just let me-” he trails off, rising to his feet and trying to maintain balance. All of my adrenaline is gone and what’s left is the shock. I stand solid as Spiderman is hobbling through the window and into my room.  
Spiderman is in my room.  
Bringing his second leg over the window pane, he stands for merely a second before completely collapsing into the floor. The sound of the impact draws me from my stupor and I’m back in a sober mindset. First, I close the window and make sure no one saw him enter. Then I draw the curtains shut and drop to my knees next to Spiderman’s crumpled form.  
“How do you know my name?” I ask cautiously. He doesn’t answer. Instead, he carelessly lifts his right hand and grips the top of his mask. With a groan, he pulls the mask off of his head-  
“What the fuck?!” I involuntarily screech. “JJ?”  
At the mention of his name, JJ looks up at me from his position on the floor. His elbows are tucked underneath him as if he were army crawling, and his legs seem to provide no aid to his cowering form. Spiderman-JJ-is on my floor, fucking dying, what the fuck do I do? Through short gasps for breath and a furrowed brow of concern, JJ looks up at me as I stand from my spot next to him on the floor.  
“I should call an ambulance!”  
“I-” he coughs unwillingly, “I don’t have insurance.”  
“You’re a crime fighting vigilante with virtually no super powers and you don’t have insurance?” I squeak in utter disbelief.  
“AAUUUGHH!” JJ exaggerates a groan to express the absolute agony he’s in.  
“Alright, alright, I hear you. What happened to you? What are you doing here?”  
“Dad- dad’s at home, drunk. I didn’t know where else to go. You’re the only one who can help me, Y/n.”

Kneeling back onto the ground, I sling JJ’s left arm over my right shoulder, and help bring him back to his feet.  
“You’re bleeding all over my carpet,” I point out, which makes him snort a small laugh.  
Maybe this is where he has been all day: getting beaten to a pulp.  
Slowly, carefully, I lead JJ across the tan carpet and into my bathroom down the hall. He’s coughing with each step and I wince as I think about all the different kinds of fluids that could be in his lungs right now.  
Releasing the arm that was slung across my shoulders, I duck underneath the tired limb and give support to his torso, avoiding the gashes that litter his frame. He turns his back towards the sink and settles his weight on top of the counter with another groan. His breathing is shallow but beginning to even. The pain of his heart weighs on his mind and his eyes fall closed in exhaustion.  
I watch with a heavy heart before realizing I can’t just stare at him all night. Sparing one last longing glance at JJ’s distressed form, I squat down to retrieve the first aid kit from beneath the sink.  
Bandages, gauze, peroxide… where is the neosporin? It’s probably in the bottom of the kit somewhere. I grip the edge of the counter to pull myself up with the first aid kid in tow. When I’m back on my feet, I can see JJ has reopened his eyes and one of them is beginning to swell.  
The first aid kit is pressed against JJ’s left thigh, I’m standing between both legs, and the brown hand towel that used to rest on the drying rack is flush against JJ’s right thigh. I take a brief moment to survey all of his injuries and recognize what’s most dire.  
His hair is consistently disheveled, but now there’s blood seeping across his hairline. His eyebrows always carry some sense of playfulness, but now they are split and blood seeps across his eyelids. His lips that always carry his signature smirk are now busted and puffy from enduring some ungodly amount of pressure. His collar bones that always support his tormented head are now sliced open, and they spill the crimson tragedies that so often threaten to spill when he least desires. His chest, that shields his own heart and occasionally shelters mine, is riddled with bruises old and new. His abdomen, that normally serves as the best pillow during movie night, is disturbed by a giant gash; the one that was the primary source of the blood stain on my carpet.  
Despite all the injuries that cover the top half of his body, I'm sure none of them compare to the pain of holding all of his troubles in his heart, never to be released to anyone else.  
“JJ…” I decide to break the silence in favor of getting answers. “We tell each other everything... Why didn’t you tell me about being Spiderman?” JJ lets out a frustrated sigh that indicates I had struck a nerve; I had asked the one question he was probably praying I wouldn’t ask.  
“I couldn’t tell you about Spiderman because it makes you a target,” he recites as if he’s mulled over this hypothetical conversation a million times in his mind.  
“A target?”  
“Yeah. You get your very own pair of khakis and a red polo shirt.”  
“You’re really going to sass me while I’m helping you?”  
“Maybe I am,” he challenges, his infamous smirk returning to his beaten features. I poke the inside of my cheek with my tongue for a second, accepting his challenge.  
“Neosporin is in the medicine cabinet on your right,” I toss the rag I was preparing to warm at his chest and move to exit the bathroom.  
“Wait! No, don’t kill yourself babe ur so sexy aha,” JJ pulls the infamous fuckboy face of squinted eyes and a ‘seductive’ lip bite, brushing the end of his chin with his hands in finger guns; I can tell he’s hoping that laughter will lure me back into treating his wounds.  
“That’s what I thought.”

The swishing of the tap fills the air amidst the silence between JJ and me. I toss the dark blue washcloth under the cool water as I wait for it to warm up. Rather than waste time waiting, I set up my materials along the edge of the counter to take inventory of what I have. Bandages, gauze, and peroxide from under the counter- neosporin from the medicine cabinet. Antibacterial ointment just in case the neosporin is expired.  
“Be still,” I say, looking up once more to take in all of his damaged features. He is still so beautiful even when covered in blood.  
I start with his face when I figure that’s probably the most painful of the injuries. Well, that and the giant abdominal slice. I reach behind JJ’s slouched body to turn off the water and retrieve the now warm cloth.  
Gently, I press the surface of the cloth to the dried blood that surrounds the split in his eyebrow. The added heat and moisture lets me wipe away the previously hardened blood, and I’m careful not to reopen the busted brow.  
“I swear that was deep enough to need stitches, how has that already scabbed over?” I ask myself in a hushed voice. JJ laughs at my inner-becoming outer-monologue and I forget he’s intently listening to everything I say. I repeat the process of cleaning his other eyebrow and apply neosporin to both impacted areas, after checking the expiration date of course.  
In the rhythm of cleaning, I begin humming a song to entertain myself. I gently massage some arnica gel into the bruises around the corner of his mouth and on the height of his cheekbone. From there, I work my way down to his split lip, and I run the cooled washcloth under warm water again. The water turns red and brown as it falls through the cloth and rinses away the remnants of his injuries.  
Coming back up to his lips I cloak my index finger in the cloth and gently clean the surrounding area. Blood isn't a stubborn substance, but I don't want to erode the skin of his face any further.  
“Are you singing One Direction?” His question causes me to suddenly stop my movement. From my position, eye-level with his mouth, I look up to meet his eyes. My own expression morphs into a smile and I extend my arms to rest my palms on the end of the sink, boxing his legs in between them.  
“I don’t know, JJ. What song am I singing?” He pauses to think for a short moment. One direction was my middle school jam and JJ is extremely entertained by my life-long obsession. This resulted in him indulging me and listening to the 'best of One Direction' playlist I made on Spotify.  
“It’s Fireproof. Right?”  
“Mhm,” I nod, resuming my work on his bleeding lip. I set the cloth down as it’s gone cold once again, and search the counter for the tube of neosporin. Except it's not next to the peroxide where I had left it. In my frenzy of looking for the medicine, I can feel JJ’s breath on my face in short puffs... He’s laughing at me.  
“What-” when I look at him I see the white and yellow tube extruding from his right hand. “Don’t touch my stuff you worm,” I harshly snatch the container from his hand which makes him laugh harder.  
“Yes, nurse Y/n,” he sits up straight as a board to salute me mockingly, which he clearly doesn't think through as he's slouched over in pain from the sudden movement. I roll my eyes but can’t stop the smile spreading across my face. Leaning back down once again, I pour some of the hydrogen peroxide over the cloth and carefully dab the open wound. JJ flinches and I can feel his breath fan across the top of my head. I thought it was just an initial reaction but he begins exhaling small puffs of air once more... He’s laughing again.  
“What is it now?” exasperated, I stand straight to see his face. His laugh is far less playful this time, and far more smug. JJ looks down at me and his laugh cockily crescendos. I don’t return his smile. Instead, I simply raise and eyebrow to silently ask for answers.  
“You’re not wearing a bra,” He states behind a smirk. I’m suddenly made aware that in my panic to help JJ, I didn’t even think about what I was-or wasn’t-wearing. Slamming the washcloth into his chest, I nearly knock him off balance before using my free hands to cover my chest.  
“I’m trying to help you, you piece of shit!” JJ laughs loud and hard with his eyes squeezed shut. “It’s not funny! You are such an asshole sometimes, you know that?”  
“No, come back-” JJ says between laughs, “it’s fine!” He calls after me as I rush back into my room to retrieve a bra from my closet.  
“No, you freak!”  
__________________________  
Since the ‘lack of pajamas’ fiasco, I had JJ take off the top half of his suit so I could tend to the gash in his torso. The blood continued seeping into the fabric of his suit even after he had slipped it off; I got squeamish from how large the cut is, but couldn’t help but notice his body. JJ looks as if he’s been chiseled by the gods themselves. I also couldn’t help my desire to run my hand along his washboard abs, but I was able to play it off as 'wiping some blood away'.  
“With your bare hand?” he asked skeptically. I just nodded because I wouldn’t dare look him in the eyes after such a weak moment.  
“Almost done, I just need to clean this area,” I mutter to JJ from my crouched position. After dressing all of the dire injuries, the only one that’s left is a fairly large nick at the top of his right pectoral muscle. Upon closer inspection, I see something lodged underneath the skin. My gaze doesn’t break from trying to decipher what it is that’s under his skin as I reach blindly for a pair of tweezers. JJ understands what I’m trying to do, and hands me the narrow tweezers that I will retire from using on my eyebrows after tonight.  
I use my index finger and thumb of my left hand to hold the surrounding skin taut, and I gently insert the open end into his wound. JJ involuntarily lets out a small hiss but quickly reassures me he’s fine for me to continue working. After a few moments of struggling, I’ve gotten a good grip on the metal chunk and I remove it from his chest. The surface of the piece is covered in chunks of his coagulated blood which makes me grimace, and I rinse off the blood before tossing the offending shrapnel into the trash can.  
After the typical peroxide, neosporin, bandage, rinse, and repeat routine, I take a small step backwards to get a general overview of his injuries to make sure I didn’t miss anything. The second time over, I notice his eyebrow has opened and began to bleed again. It’s about as bad as I originally thought.  
“J, you really need stitches.”  
“I don’t have insurance.”  
“I know,” I sigh. I wish there was more I could do for him but my nursing degree is nonexistent. Upon deciding to redress the split in his brow, I lean forward to apply pressure on the wound with the diluted-hydrogen peroxide washcloth. My focus is inconsistent since I just have to hold the cloth in place for a bit. The lack of restriction allows me to realize JJ is staring right into my eyes. His gaze causes me to relax my own tense brows. The unyielding pressure against his face can’t feel good, but he shows no sign of discomfort. In fact, it seems to be quite the opposite.  
JJ‘s eyes offer a warm condolence and the corners of his mouth twitch upwards. The tip of his tongue dabs out to wet his lips, an action that seems subconscious until I see he’s noticed my staring at his lips.  
“So,” I clear my throat to divert both of our attention, “how exactly did you get all these injuries?”  
“Green Goblin smashed me between two trains.”  
“What the fuck, how are you alive?”  
“You’re the only one who I’ve told this to, so you can’t tell anyone this…” JJ then proceeds to tell me about how one night, when he was home alone, there was a weird looking spider on his window. He went to pick it up, because god knows why, and it straight up bit the palm of his hand. He freaked out a bit, then felt woozy and just blacked out. The next morning he was immensely stronger, stickier, and hyper-aware of everything around him-something he calls a ‘spidey sense’.  
In the middle of discovering his new powers, his dad came home, drunk as ever and the typical string of abuses ensued. This time was different. His sense allowed him to evade his dad’s attacks and his strength was enough to defend himself.  
All before 8 AM.  
I can’t imagine how scared and anxious he must’ve felt.  
“Well... whenever you need to crash somewhere safe from superhero issues or even family issues, you’re always welcome here. No questions asked.” JJ gingerly hops off of the bathroom sink and pulls me into a tight hug. My forehead wrinkles as I think about how long it may have been since JJ's last had a proper hug.  
__________________________  
The perk of constantly stealing JJ’s clothes means I have spares for when he comes over. Grabbing one of his t-shirts from my dresser and an old pair of his basketball shorts, JJ is able to change into clothes without blood or holes covering them.  
“You think you’ll be able to sleep after what happened tonight?” He simply shrugs before tugging the shirt over his head.  
“It’s not any worse than what’s happened before.”  
“Hold on,” I step closer to confirm my suspicions, “you bled through your bandaid again.” I run to the bathroom to see I had used all of the tan bandages.  
There have to be some bandaids in here.  
“So, you used all of my tan bandaids which means you’ll have to settle for Hello Kitty,” I say, holding up the half-emptied box. JJ clutches both hands over his heart in agony,  
“No! Hello Kitty bandaids are my one weakness!” I sit cross-legged on the center of my bed and beckon him over to join me. Once he’s sat down, I remove the bloodied bandage and stick the Hello Kitty one across his eyebrow. JJ smiles a soft, lazy smile at me once again before allowing his eyes to flutter shut.  
“Tired?”  
“No. Just happy.” Before I can stop myself, I lean forward and place a kiss on his right cheek. His smile grows even bigger, despite his injured lip.  
“...It’s bedtime,” I lightly push his chest as leverage to get up and turn off my light.  
Sliding back into bed, I settle underneath the covers and lift the other side for JJ to join me. He obliges and curls up next to me.  
“Goodnight, JJ.”  
“Goodnight, Y/n.”


	6. Best Friends' Rooftop Rendezvous

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: Shifting gears to focus on making the documentary about JJ was a smart plan that had unfortunately come to a brief stop seeing as JJ needs your help more than ever right now. He shows up to your window beaten and on the verge of death claiming he has nowhere else to go and expects you to be emotionally okay with that? If only he knew just how fast your heart beats when watching old videos. How fast it beats when you see that he looks at you as if you were the one to hang the stars in the sky.

“Hey, Y/n?... Y/n?”  
“Hm?” I groan without opening my eyes. I’m exhausted but I’m not sleepy, quite the opposite actually. My mind is constantly moving at 1000 miles per hour, and JJ showing up tonight fueled the restlessness.   
“I can’t sleep.”  
“Me neither.” JJ and I sigh in unison as the silence of my apartment consumes us once again. Between the two of us, the only sounds to be heard are my erratic breathing and JJ’s rustling of the blankets. Gasping in a huge breath, I exhale on a ‘sigh’ that’s dramatic enough to be used on an Italian soap opera.  
“Come on,” I fling the covers off of my legs and walk over to my closet to grab a pair of sneakers that I can slip on quickly.  
“Where are we going?”  
“Come on!” JJ obliges and grabs a hoodie I stole as well as a pair of black low top Vans. The tips of my fingers are greeted by the crisp evening breeze as they slide under the base of the window. Using all the arm strength I can muster at almost 2 AM, I open the window about half way before slipping between the crack. I look back to make sure JJ is following me onto the fire escape and begin to climb the last few flights of stairs to reach the rooftop.   
The cool metal of the railing chills my hands more than the air of Queens; it is the sight of the city lights from the rooftop that chills my entire body. The nerves in my hands and legs seize slightly to warn me against standing near the edge, and I puff out a small breath to soothe them.   
“Woah,” I hear JJ whisper. Turning a full 180, JJ’s eyes connect with mine and the unexpected contact makes both of us smile. Our exchange only lasts a brief moment as I break away, awkwardly, unable to withstand another moment of JJ studying me so intently.  
“So, uh, what are your plans for formal?”  
“Is it winter formal already?”  
“Yeah idiot, it’s already December. What are your plans?”  
“Oh, I don’t know. I thought we were all just gonna go together as a group. I mean I know things are different now that Sarah and John B are together, and we’re ‘dating’, but we’re all still one group, right?”  
“Right.”  
“Were you planning on something different?” I ask JJ sincerely. He’s fidgeting uncomfortably and refusing to meet my eyes. “JJ?” he doesn’t respond. Instead, he spins to face me squarely.   
“Do you hope to get out of here one day?”  
“What?”  
“Do you want to leave New York ever?”  
“I don’t know…” It’s my turn to refuse eye contact but JJ isn’t having it; he places his index finger under my chin and tilts my face up to see his. “Of course I want to leave the city at some point but indefinitely? I’m not sure… Why? Do you?”  
“I think… I think Spiderman gave me a way to feel like I could get out of here if I wanted to, so I don’t feel the need to leave.”   
I don’t give a real response. Just a sort of hum of acknowledgement.   
The city is usually pretty polluted, but tonight, JJ and I got lucky. It seems like every star that has ever been documented is out and shining in its full glory tonight. How long has it been since I’ve been stargazing? Who knew it would take JJ showing up on my fire escape to get me outside again? Granted, it’s 2 AM, but still.  
“JJ?”  
“Yes, love?”  
“Love? That’s a new one- hey do you remember the night that we met?”  
“Night? It was day.”  
“...No it wasn’t...”  
“Yes, it was!”  
“No it was not! We met at Sarah’s back to school party in 10th grade.”  
“No. We met earlier that Friday when Sarah came over to me and John B at lunch so she could invite us to her party and you came over with her.”  
I open my mouth to respond, but close it immediately after. JJ continues,  
“She introduced us all to each other but you were too busy avoiding eye contact and fiddling with the settings on your camera-”  
“I have social anxiety, JJ!”  
“Point is, we met at lunch that friday and the party was later that night to ‘celebrate surviving the first week of tenth grade’,” JJ uses air quotes as he recalls Sarah’s words verbatim.  
I’m speechless once again. How does JJ remember that better than I do? Before I use my better judgement, my curiosity overtakes my verbal filter.  
“Wait, why did you come over to me at the party then if you knew I was so… cringe.”  
“You weren’t cringe-”  
“I wouldn’t even look at you when you said hi.”  
“Well…” JJ’s defensive demeanor has disappeared completely, “...it was cute.” His confession catches me off guard.  
“Cute?”  
“Yeah, in a ‘my instincts say protect at all costs’ kind of way.”  
“Do I really give off that vibe?”  
“Not anymore. You were probably just so scarred from Freshman year, you didn’t seem to think Sophomore year would be any better.”  
JJ is on a roll tonight with rendering me speechless. I’ve told him about how miserable Freshman year was for me, but I hardly expect anyone to remember my name, let alone a personal fact about me.   
But this is JJ.  
He’s got me all figured out it seems.  
“So?”  
“...So?”  
“Why did you come up to me at the party?”  
“I don’t know, I guess I just figured after not knowing anything but your name at lunch, surely there’s more to you than the fact that you know how to work a camera.”  
“So you wanted to know more about me?”  
“Sure.”  
“Why do you say it like that?”  
“Like what?” JJ asks, crossing his arms over his broad, ripped chest. It’s not out of defense or discomfort, it’s the winter air biting at both of our underdressed forms.  
“Come on, what’s the real reason, JJ?”  
“I already said!”  
“No you didn’t!”  
“Yeah, I said because you were cute!” His aggressively sweet words force a fond smile onto my face, and I can’t help but admire how he looks. With the moonlight and city lights working in tandem to illuminate his pale, flushed face, I can see just how bright his ocean blue eyes shine in contrast with the blush dusting his cheeks. It’s in this moment, I realize just how close the two of us are standing to one another. So close, I can feel the heat radiating off of his face and onto mine.  
How did I get so lucky?  
“I mean… just… standing there, looking at you from across the room. I knew I wanted you to be a part of my life.” JJ’s expression mirrors mine, which is one of admiration and adoration.   
His contentment is short lived. JJ’s face morphs from a look of gentleness to one of subtle alarm and unease.  
“JJ?”  
“SHH.”  
“Wha-”  
“SHH… we’re not alone...” My eyes drift from his worried expression to the hairs standing on end at the base of his neck.  
A loud CLANG rattles on the rooftop with us. JJ and I look around to locate the source of the noise that made the two of us jump out of our skin.   
Time seems to slow to a fraction of what it once was, as JJ and I lay eyes on the offending object at the same time. It’s a small, metal… pumpkin? The device begins beeping at a high frequency.   
Once. Twice. Three times. Four.  
“Maybank!”  
“GOBLIN!” JJ practically growls. Standing less than 20 feet away from us is a man whose entire body is masked by hoards of green metal. The face is molded in a stagnant snarl, exposing the creature’s ridged teeth. Its ears are pointed and blend into the engorged brain case of the man’s suit.  
When I turn to look at JJ, I see another one of those pumpkin things hurling towards him, but before it lands, he punts the device in mid-air. I train my eyes on the pumpkin as it goes flying back toward where it came from.   
I can’t take the time to be impressed by JJ’s accuracy as he’s ushering me back toward the fire escape.  
“Y/N, RUN!”


	7. Boyfriend?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: You and JJ tried to settle in for a goodnight’s rest, but you’re both too restless for sleep. Instead, you both decide stargazing is a nice way to spend the evening. Just a peaceful night of arguing about how and when you first met. The usual. JJ is such an amazing friend, that’s what that feeling is, right? The warm butterflies in your stomach. Your admiration for your best friend is cut short when the “green goblin” tries to fucking blow you up.

Hoisting myself over the ledge of the rooftop, JJ is quick to recover from nailing the bomb back in the psychos direction and is right behind me. The cold of the metal railing is no longer a shock. Instead, it burns underneath my palms, scorching my nerves as a result of my panic.   
“Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck”  
“Hurry!” JJ ushers me back through my half open window before frantically diving in after me. Who would’ve thought we were peacefully enjoying each other’s company not just 10 minutes ago, and now we’re being hunted by some loon in a goblin furry suit? And are goblins even furries?   
The SLAM of the window draws me from my panicked stupor and I can see the fear radiating off of JJ. I struggle to my feet to face his anxious figure, yanking the curtains shut behind us. He has to do this every week? I mean he’s just a kid.   
“Who the fuck was that?!”  
“His name is Green Goblin. He’s the guy that made me look like this,” JJ gestures to his busted appearance.  
“Did he follow you here? How does he know your name?”  
“I don’t know I-”  
JJ’s pacing comes to a screeching halt. His hands are tangled into his knotted hair, his breathing is sharp and unstable; his eyes are wide under his furrowed brows as they flick from my freshly vacuumed carpet to my own widened eyes. JJ then dashes out of my bedroom, which leads me to follow closely behind in confusion.  
From around the corner, I hear JJ’s labored breathing from inside the bathroom. Once I’m standing in the doorway, I can clearly see JJ is practically turning the room upside down. He has clumsily knocked the leftover first aid supplies off the counter, and into the sink. The trashcan is on its side and it looks as if a raccoon had gotten into my bathroom. Toilet paper and flossers are flying as JJ frantically digs through the trash.  
“What the hell are you doing?”  
JJ doesn’t answer. Instead, he pointedly extends his arm toward my face. I had to take a step backwards to get my eyes to register what he’s trying to show me. Pinched between his thumb and index fingers is the tiny piece of shrapnel I removed from his body not that long ago.   
JJ wordlessly places the chunk of metal on the lip of the sink, and balls his hand into a fist. Then, he lifts the fisted hand above his head and swings it down to smash the chip into a million tiny pieces. Apparently, JJ still isn’t used to his super strength because alongside smashing the shrapnel into dust, what was the ledge of my sink, is also on the floor in a bunch of broken pieces. Backtracking his movement leads my eyes from the rubble, to JJ’s fist-sized disparity in my sink, to his equally as shocked expression.   
“What the fuck, JJ?”  
“That was a GPS! He must’ve used it to track me. We have to go.”  
“What the fuck do I tell my mom about the counter, JJ?”  
“We aren’t safe here, Y/n!”  
“Where the hell are we going to go at 1 AM on a Thursday night?”  
“We’ll figure it out. For now we just gotta get out of the building!”  
And before I can protest, JJ grabs my hand in his larger, calloused one and pulls me out of the bathroom.   
__________________________  
“Stop... I think- we lost him,” JJ gasps for air throughout his sentence as we’ve been sprinting for at least 8 blocks, “Here.” He extends his hand to mine once again and leads us into a dark alleyway so that we don’t compromise our position to goblin.   
“We should go to my house.”  
“JJ, no, your dad will kill you if you set foot in there while he’s intoxicated.”  
“I have to. My only other suit is in my room,” JJ says whilst doubled over, shaking his head ‘no’.  
“Are you stupid?!”  
“What?”  
“You cannot fight Goblin again. Not tonight.”  
“Why not?”  
“Look at you, JJ! You have a hole in your stomach!”  
“It’ll heal, Y/n.”  
“And what if it doesn't?”  
My infuriation doesn’t fall on deaf ears. JJ might have limited emotional intelligence and availability, but he can sense just how upset I am. Why would he even consider suiting up tonight?   
“Okay…” JJ puffs out one final sigh and then returns to a neutral standing position, “What do we do?”  
An uneasy lull of silence settles over the two of us in this dank alleyway. I shake my head, unsure.  
Looking across the street I recognize the accounting firm that sits on the corner. Which means… I jog out of the alley and into the streetlights, turning right to round the corner of the block.  
The laundromat.   
The laundromat reminds me of the night I first ran into Spiderman, well, JJ as Spiderman, and that reminds me that I was carrying a to-go box, and that reminds me of Ozzy’s, and Ozzy’s reminds me of…  
“The Pogues.”  
“Huh?”  
“We need the Pogues. Goblin can never find you if you’re hiding in plain sight.”  
“Okay?” JJ looks at me, puzzled, “So, where is plain sight?”  
__________________________  
“Y/n, you better have a damn good reason for bringing us out here at one in the morning,” Kiara scolds me with a yawn. Her bed-hair clearly indicates that my text woke her from a deep sleep. Kie was the last of the group to show up which isn’t usually the case but IT IS after midnight.  
The gang slowly piled in, each of us greeted by the ever-chipper graveyard favorite, Jennifer. She brings us coffee which we could all probably use to stay awake for the insane conversation to come.   
“We can’t tell them. It’s too dangerous,” JJ whispers to only me. All six of us are crammed into our usual booth, but I can tell everyone is too tired to care to hear our sidebar. The unfortunate fact is, they’re all awake enough to be concerned as to why JJ and I needed them to gather ‘ASAP’.   
JJ leans down to whisper something else that, due to Pope’s exhausted glaring at us, I don’t register immediately.  
“What is going on with you two?” He finally speaks up from across the table.   
“Why are you sweating? Did you guys really hook up in the bathroom before we got here?” John B teases from behind his already empty coffee mug. JJ is usually a master-bullshitter but right now he’s sputtering like an untouched car from 1980.   
I can’t compromise his identity, but it doesn’t seem like he’s able to offer an explanation right now, judging by the lack of color in his face. Against my better judgement, I open my big fat mouth (prematurely because I haven’t thought of a thorough explanation).  
“JJ and I are dating!” Oh boy. As the restaurant falls silent, I realize I yelled my declaration of our romance, and now I want nothing more than to dig myself a hole to die in. Pope is the first to speak up,  
“I’m guessing you found what you were looking for in Brooklyn tod-“ JJ cuts him off with a harsh wide-eyed stare. Weird, but I’m just gonna ignore it.  
“I think it’s great you two are together,” Sarah attempts to ease my embarrassment. I just know I’m not gonna be able to sleep tonight, I’ll be too busy cringing at what is now my most embarrassing moment.  
All JJ and I can do is nod awkwardly at the others, and I’m doing everything I can to avoid eye contact with him.  
“Is that why you guys brought us here tonight? Your emergency meeting was to tell us you’ve been macking on each other?” John B seems less than thrilled at the ‘news’, but amused nonetheless.  
“Mhm.”   
“We wanted to… come clean with you guys… because friends don’t keep secrets and we didn’t want… our relationship, to potentially ruin the group dynamic… of the pogues…” I trail off, making the situation 1000 times more awkward. My inability to shut up ruined the light Sarah made of the conversation, and the group has simmered into a weird, exhausted silence.   
Suddenly the bell on the front door signals a god-given diversion, and the pogues all turn to see who’s entered the restaurant. As if anyone could relieve the tension of the group.   
We’re on a roll with bad luck tonight.  
Because in through the door comes Mr. Osborn, bitter as ever; he immediately notices us and delivers an intense stare that we all subconsciously take as a cue to leave. All of our farewells begin to overlap with one another's.  
“It’s been swell.”  
“See you guys in the morning.”  
“Do you need a ride home?”  
__________________________  
JJ and I are the last to leave the diner, but the first to resume the awkward silence. I pretend to be distracted by the moon’s reflection in the windows of the adjacent buildings on our walk back to my house. JJ insisted on walking in front to make sure everything was ‘safe’ but he’s somehow ended up walking behind me.  
“So,” he breaks the silence with a mischievous tone, “I’m your boyfriend, huh?”  
“Stop! I know. I literally couldn’t stop myself, it was just word vomit.” He laughs at my misfortune. JJ’s laughter settles into a fond smile once he sees that I’m beyond mortified,  
“Not your finest moment, I’ll admit.” another moment of silence settles between us, but it’s short lived as we’ve reached the bottom of my building’s fire escape. JJ lowers the ladder for me, “After you, madame.”  
I hesitate to climb, wondering why we can’t just go inside. But then I remember my house key remains untouched on the granite kitchen counter. Good call, JJ.  
Despite how uncomfortable the night has been, I dread each step up the escape. I don’t want JJ to leave. I feel safe knowing there’s a superhero to look after me - who cares to look after me. Maybe he won’t leave.   
All I have to do is ask, right?  
I’m building my courage to ask once we reach my bedroom window. I know the fact about when you’re faced with a split decision, if you don’t do it in 10 seconds, you’re not going to do it… but I like to defeat the odds sometimes. 1...  
“Thanks for not getting us killed, I guess?”   
“I’ll let you off on an IOU,” JJ teases. The air falls quiet once again, but this time it’s serene. 2... It’s lovely to just be in his presence, just the two of us. 3...  
His ocean blue eyes focus on mine, 4... they ignite a warmth in me that the air of Queens can’t provide. 5... Without the explanation of words, I can tell JJ feels the exact same way. 6. The feeling falters only slightly because his eyes flick down to my flushed lips, 7, then back up to my eyes.  
“Thank you… for everything,” JJ says before enveloping my cold body in a hug. 8. I feel him place a kiss on the top of my freshly shampooed hair. 9.  
“Of course. That’s what best friends are for…”  
“Yeah… best friends.” 10...  
“You know, you don’t have to go home. You can stay here tonight.”  
“Oh… okay.”  
“Hey. I love you, but you smell so bad right now,” I say as he still hasn’t released me from his hug. Above my head, I hear JJ giggle evilly. Before I can speak, he squeezes his arms around me tighter, smothering me in his gross boy germs.  
“Ew! JJ!”   
His evil laugh becomes a genuine one and he releases me from his suffocating grip. His eyes lazily encapsulate mine, and his smile makes my heart beat a tiny bit faster. Scents aside, he looks beautiful in the moonlight, with the shitty background of Queens skyscrapers to frame him.  
“Maybe we should stay off the roof for a little while.”  
“Yeah, good call.”


	8. Deny Deny Deny

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: Green Goblin is practically hunting you and JJ, and though he’s stupid enough to try and fight with a hole in his stomach, there’s no chance in hell you’d let him. Operation Flight Not Fight goes underway as you two request the pogues join you for a one am cuppa at Ozzy’s. The part neither of you thought about though was having to explain why you needed them there. To protect JJ’s hero identity, you both told the pogues about your ‘relationship’. What’ll happen when they need to be convinced you’re actually dating.

Much like the night I first met Spiderman, last night also does not feel real. Being chased by a lunatic will do that to you. The main reason it feels like a dream is that JJ is no longer sleeping next to me. I don’t know if he left two minutes before I woke up or two minutes after I fell asleep, but all I know is that I wish he had stayed. The kid is such an idiot I’m constantly worried sick about him. I know, I know he can handle himself, I just don’t like how he gets bruised in the process.  
Last night was the first time in a while since I’ve seen him vulnerable, if you can even call that vulnerable. Usually those moments are reserved for when he’s bottled up all his hurt for so long he can’t help but explode. Sometimes it’s numbness and a rant that lacks emotion; other times it’s crying in my arms till he gets a dehydration headache and needs to pass out.  
Both situations are equally painful for me to watch, but I’d never let him know. JJ knows my tell for when I’m lying, but I do everything I can to keep him from noticing when I say things like ‘everything will be okay’ and ‘nothing can hurt you now’. I just hope I’m not as transparent as I feel.  
All I can do is be there for him which means holding him when he cries. Or…  
Gnomeo 💙: accidentally pulled an all-nighter. would thoust be so kind as to gift me one (1) breakfast burrito?  
Juliet ❤️: How tf do you stay up all night on accident?  
Gnomeo 💙: studying  
Juliet ❤️: You really want me to believe you stayed up studying?  
Gnomeo 💙: bruh are u gonna feed me or not  
Juliet ❤️: You’re ridiculous. I’ll be there in 20 try not to hurt yourself  
Gnomeo 💙: ill make no such promises ;)  
__________________________  
As I enter the corner store at the end of my block, I can’t help but wonder if Mom noticed that my bathroom counter is in pieces on the floor. I hope not. Then again I don’t think home depot sells bathroom sinks to minors so I guess I’ll just have to find a cover up. I could tell her that JJ broke it but the part about him doing it with his bare hand is kind of tricky to avoid. I’ll figure it out later.  
My thoughts transition from thinking of a cover story, to singing Tonight Tonight by Hot Chelle Rae as I browse the store for breakfast necessities. I’ll get him a burrito and a vanilla hazelnut coffee. Can caffeine kill him? I don’t know the rules of being bitten by a radioactive spider.  
My curiosity is cut off by the tv in the front of the store increasing in volume. Craning my neck to see the screen, I see a news report on Spiderman where the anchor is talking about his prevention of a robbery yesterday afternoon. I can’t help the small smile that creeps up onto my face now that I know who the hero is, and that, in a way, he’s mine. I know it’s fake but I can’t help revelling in the fact that JJ is sort of mine.  
“Ugh. Not this kid again.” I hear as I walk toward the counter to pay. The shop owner does not seem impressed with anything having to do with my superhero.  
“Just the burrito and coffee,” I say, placing both items on the counter between us. The man barely spares me a glance as he continues to watch the reporter praise Spiderman for his heroism.  
“$4.59. This kid swings around town once every other day and everyone worships him for it.”  
“You don’t like Spiderman?”  
“I just think there are far better people who deserve the public praise like doctors, or cops!” My mouth parts slightly in disbelief. He did not just say that.  
“You know complaints against the NYPD rose 20% from last year's numbers, putting this year’s total at 5,236. And if we’re being honest with ourselves, we know nothing about what he could be going through in his own life. He could have an absent parent and an abusive alcoholic guardian for all we know!” I passive aggressively explode at the shop owner who’s shirt reveals his name is James.  
James confusedly hands me my change and receipt. I could’ve completely compromised JJ’s identity just now, so I realize now that my best course of action is to shut up and hurry out, burrito intact.  
My almost-outburst leads me to thinking that if I can’t be trusted with his secret, maybe fake dating JJ isn’t the best idea after all. I mean, it’ll be really easy to pull off, cause I won’t have to act at all.  
What if it all gets too much for us? What if we fuck things up and JJ and I can’t be friends anymore?  
I don’t want to think about what that Y/n is like. Instead, I put on a happy face and quickly approach my friends, all huddled around our usual morning spot. Being greeted by their tired, absent smiles, I begin to feel guilty about asking them to come to the emergency Ozzy’s meeting. Maybe we should just tell them.  
“Hey, Y/n, we have a proposition for you and JJ.”  
“Shoot,” I say to John B as I hand JJ his breakfast. As Sarah begins to talk, I feel JJ lean down to press a kiss to my cheek.  
“Thank you,” he mouths silently, which makes the butterflies in my stomach multiply by the thousands.  
“And so we were thinking, now that you two are a couple we can go on double dates!” Sarah cheers in a pitch much higher than her actual speaking voice.  
“I beg your pardon.”  
“I’m serious,” she continues.  
“We’re already friends, so it won’t be terribly awkward,” John B adds to try and help build Sarah’s case. I can tell this definitely wasn’t his idea, but he’s going along with it to make her happy.  
“Please?”  
“I think it’s a great idea,” JJ answers for both of us. He’s in a good mood despite being awake all night. I’m not surprised he’s happy, I'm more surprised he’s functioning. Well, sort of functioning. The ringing of the first bell has him jumping out of his skin but you win some you lose some.  
As per usual, the group all divide to go their separate ways and once we’re out of earshot from the others, I ask JJ a convicting question.  
“You really think it’s a good idea for us to be going on actual dates?” JJ being JJ, he doesn’t miss a beat.  
“If we wanna sell the couple routine we should be public.”  
“Are you worried about… you know,” I pray he understands what I’m trying to say. Much to my surprise, he spares me the act of playing dumb,  
“No, actually. I’m not worried about anything,” he says so casually that I begin to doubt his understanding of what I was trying to convey. I keep my eyes trained on the ground and nod my head to gage some sort of response. It’s in this moment that I notice how slow our walking pace is today. Normally we move quick enough to dodge the flow of traffic but right now it feels like it’s just us.  
The lull in the conversation allows JJ to get cheeky and he extends his pinky to brush the side of my hand for my approval. I don’t pull away like he was probably expecting me to. I open my hand instead, and fully accept his intertwining of our fingers. My eyes don’t leave the floor as an unstoppable grin consumes my face. Glancing out of the corner of my eye, I see JJ staring at me.  
“Do you… not think it’s a good idea?” He breaks our comfortable silence. JJ is already staring at me when I turn to look at him, and the huge smile on my face transfers over to his.  
“What’s not a good idea?”  
“Going on dates.”  
“Oh. No, it’s great,” I squeeze JJ’s hand in reassurance. He doesn’t seem to pick up on my hesitance which is a great relief. But then again, how is he not worried about developing feelings?  
“Dope. See you in physics, babe.”  
Babe. I could get used to that.  
JJ’s eyes sparkle mischievously and before I can ask what he’s plotting, he leans down and places a lingering kiss on my cheek. All too soon, he’s flashing me one last toothy grin before heading off to his own class.  
I could get used to that, too.  
__________________________  
“Did I ever tell you about that time when I went out to get food after patrolling and it was like 2 AM? I accidentally went into this couple’s apartment next door to mine, and I get to the living room where they were watching a horror movie. Then, they both looked at me so terrified and screamed and I just fuckin’ stood there with my burrito.”  
“That is such bullshit,” I say to JJ, who’s telling me this story at top volume over the sound of the bell, as we’re walking into Osborn’s room. As per usual, he’s death glaring us for the noise, and JJ is ignoring him.  
We take our seats and Osborn practically beelines for us as he begins to pass out last week’s graded homework packets.  
“Maybank, Y/l/n, you really shouldn’t be hanging out with friends so late at night. Especially when that restaurant was almost robbed not too long ago.” I speechlessly glance at JJ but he’s completely unbothered by Osborn’s creepiness. “Might be difficult for someone like Spiderman to protect you so late at night, no?”  
“What are you talking about?” JJ asks, unamused with Osborn’s pensive scolding.  
“That Spiderman kid seems awfully young, around your ages, and he’s probably responsible with his sleep schedule.” All I can do is simply hum in befuddled agreeance. Why is he being ever weirder than normal? Is he actually qualified to be a teacher or is he just some random who waltzed right in off the street? Who’s to say, really.  
I just hope that the rest of the class won’t be this awkward.  
As if on cue, my prayer is answered and Sarah Cameron is standing in the metal regulation doorframe.  
“Mr. Osborn, can I borrow Y/n and JJ? It’s for yearbook and journalism pieces.”  
“What about?”  
“Uh, school spirit.” Sarah’s answer seems valid, much to Osborn’s dismay, and he exasperatedly turns to look at JJ and I slowly putting our things away.  
“Should they take their stuff with them?”  
“It might take the rest of the period.”  
“Alright.” He seems very annoyed but not annoyed enough to actually keep us from going with Sarah. I stand up to sling my backpack on and JJ pushes in both of our chairs, per Osborn’s class regulations. I can tell JJ is excited to leave because he rushes over to where Sarah is without even looking back to see if I’m following.  
“So, a school spirit exposé?” I ask once we’ve rounded the corner of the hallway, out of earshot from the classroom.  
“I’m not actually interviewing you, I just figured you’d enjoy being out of Osborn’s. He was being super weird and creepy last night.”  
“You’re a G, Sarah.”  
“He actually scolded us and told us we ‘shouldn’t be hanging out with friends so late’. Like, what the fuck?” Sarah and JJ laugh, but cut themselves off as we all see Kie in front of the vending machines.  
“Yo, what are you doing out of class?” I call to her, speeding up as I see she has Cheez-Its.  
“I ditched once I realized we were still doing limits.”  
“You guys wanna head to our lunch spot early and manifest that Pope and John B show up?” Sarah offers, stealing a Cheez-It from what has now become ‘our’ Cheez-Its.

I tell JJ to relay his bullshit story to the two girls, and to my surprise Sarah believes him.  
“You cannot sit there and tell me you actually believe this story!”  
“I don’t know, it doesn’t seem that out of character for him.”  
“Thank you!”  
“Whatever. Kie and I are intellectuals and that’s a story for the ThatHappened Reddit page.”  
Then, the show bell rings to say there are six minutes left in the period.  
“Have we really been out of class that long?” I ask in disbelief. Surely that was only a couple of minutes.  
“Guess so,” JJ responds as we all simultaneously lay eyes on none other than John B.  
“What are you doing here?”  
“I told Pecorac I needed to pee and he didn’t notice the bell was about to ring,” he answers nonchalantly before stealing the last Cheez-It. The group begins to walk to our lunch spot as I’m about to ask if we should wait for Pope. JJ’s spidey sense hasn’t made him that observant so I have to jog to catch up to the group that unintentionally left me behind.  
When I catch up, I try to squeeze between John B. and JJ but once I feel the slightest bit of resistance, I can tell they’re barricading me on purpose. Sarah doesn’t turn around either so I can tell she’s also in on it.  
I gently push against JJ’s unnecessarily toned back muscles and he stiffens up without breaking eye contact with JB. Stopping to pout for a second, I realize I can dart around JJ’s right side, but as I’m about to pass him, JJ stops in his tracks and leans his body weight against me.  
“MOVE!” I whine pushing harder to walk forward. Kie laughs at me and gets the others to give up the joke, but JJ still won’t let me through.  
I try to go around him once more, and this time he turns around to pull me into a bone-crushing hug.  
“JJ stop it!”  
“It’ll all be over soon, Y/n! Just relax!”  
“Get off of me. You smell like boy sweat,” I attempt to shove him off of me. The two of us are gasping for air, and the teacher inside the classroom we’re passing gives us a disapproving glare.  
“Shh! You’re gonna get us in trouble,” I say as I shove JJ’s shoulder with all of my strength.  
“You’re the one who was yelling!”  
***


	9. Double dates, donuts, drinks, and doubts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: JJ is slowly becoming more affectionate. To throw the Pogues off your scent of course! He’s keeps cool as a cucumber when Mr. Osborn starts grilling the hell out of you two, but how he stays calm under the pressure of carrying a secret hero identity is beyond you. Before Osborn can get any more hits in, Sarah comes to the rescue with her yearbook privileges, and another boring class period becomes a party when the rest of the Pogues slowly ditch class too.

JJ’s teasing didn’t end throughout all of lunch. In fact he’s just now let up as the six of us are all walking to Ozzy’s for afternoon pancakes. I’m not complaining because A) it was fun and B) we were kinda flirting? It isn’t real, he’s not actually flirting with me he’s just... playing the part. Playing the part very well.  
“-double date.”  
“Huh?” I ask zoning back in. Sarah and John B are both looking between me and JJ expectantly.  
“They’re asking if we wanna go on a double date,” JJ explains and slings his left arm across my shoulders.  
“Oh, yeah, well, we haven’t exactly been on a date alone yet…” I trail off the end of my sentence when I notice the beaded leather bracelet on his wrist is about to fall off. They begin talking about the date again, but I’ve tuned them out as I focus on retying JJ’s bracelet.  
“...but the more the merrier, right?” I tense up at his question as JJ has leaned down to ask only me. All I can muster is a gentle nod which makes him smile extra wide for some reason.  
“You dork,” JJ says before opening the door for me to enter the diner. Jennifer isn’t here but we’re also not here at our usual evening time, so I’m not surprised.  
Coming back to my senses, I’m now following the conversation in front of me, which consists of Sarah and John B bickering.  
“What’s wrong with dinner and a movie?”  
“Nothing’s wrong with dinner and a movie I’m just saying we could do something else that’s more fun.”  
“Like what?”  
“We could do the boardwalk.”  
“We’ve already done the boardwalk this season, why do you get to choose what we do?”  
“Because it was my idea in the first place.”  
“No, it wasn’t.”  
“Yes, it wa-”  
“Oh my god, shut up, no one cares!” JJ interrupts their back and forth abruptly. “We can do the boardwalk AND a movie, it’s not like we only have one night together!”  
As the couple realizes he’s right and begins to talk about what movies we could go and see, I notice Kie is being way awkward. She’s not the loudest of the group, she’s on the quieter side in general, but never awkward.  
Before any of us can process what’s happening, Pope is standing on our table in the middle of a public restaurant.  
He distantly speaks as he pulls a red rose from his backpack, “Kiara Carrera…”  
“Where the fuck did that come from?” JJ vocalizes what we were all thinking, as per usual.  
“...Will you be my date to winter formal?” I feel like a physical manifestation of the eye-mouth-eye emoji chain, unable to process Pope of all people asking Kie to formal on a table in Ozzy’s.  
John B, Sarah, JJ, and I all snap our heads toward Kie to see her reaction. She doesn’t look nearly as shook as we do. She’s beaming. I mean just the most radiant smile I have ever seen her smile.  
“Yes!” She stands from her seat, elated. Pope hops off of the table to stand face to face with her, and hands her the red rose.  
Pope’s face breaks out into a smile to match her energy level, and the two of them high five. Their shared excitement comes down and as they take their seats once more, the rest of the pogues all share the same look of confusion.  
No one will say it, but I can tell we’re all just thinking ‘what the fuck was that?’; the awkward silence ensues. Then, social-butterfly Sarah breaks the silence when her curiosity consumes her,  
“Are we still going to formal as a group?”  
“Of course, why wouldn’t we?” I ask, subconsciously tilting my head out of confusion.  
“Because, you and JJ are dating now, and Pope and kie I guess are a date now…”  
“Oh… I mean, we always go as a group.”  
“Now we can triple date!” JJ adds.  
__________________________  
BZZZ. The vibrations of my phone pull me out of a well earned sleep. After afternoon pancakes, we all went our separate ways meaning I needed to grind on importing the JJ footage I needed to piece together. I nearly fell asleep on my desk, but seeing as I’m buried under the covers, I managed to get myself to bed eventually.  
I roll over to turn my phone on do not disturb, and groan as the brightness blinds me. Note to self: choose a lockscreen with a dark color palette. 

Messages from Gnomeo 💙: wake up fucker

This better be important.

Juliet ❤️: It’s 5 am on a saturday what the fuck do you want from me  
Gnomeo 💙: were hanging out ya batch  
Juliet ❤️: right now right now?  
Gnomeo 💙: yes ma’am  
Juliet ❤️: Do I have to wear normal clothes?  
Gnomeo 💙: nah jus dont forget a bra this time

Asshole. I figure we’ll hang out for more than an hour, so I decide to look semi presentable.  
Grabbing my favorite comfy clothes, I go to the bathroom to wash my face and hope it’ll wake me up a bit more. I’m too exhausted to fully brush my teeth so I brush for about 30 seconds before giving up. Good enough.  
“Fuck,” I gasp when I walk back into my room. JJ’s already inside and sitting on my windowsill.  
“Why can’t you use the front door like a normal person?”  
“Your neighbors are scary, Y/n. I feel like I’m gonna get killed by Mrs. Aldony and her cat,” JJ whines and then sniffles a bit. His face is tinged pink which makes me wonder how cold it is outside; I take a moment to admire the blush across his face. He looks sort of angelic, cherubic, minus the backwards baseball hat, black long sleeve salty crew shirt, and a single strand of greasy blonde hair poking out of his hat.  
“Ready for some immersion therapy?”  
“I beg your pardon?”  
“We’re going back on the roof,” he clarifies.  
“Oh ok.” JJ extends his hand to me which I willingly take. I don’t need help out of my own window, but the extra contact won’t hurt. Together, we climb the metal stairs up toward the rooftop. There’s always people out and about but the ambient noise gives off a serenity that ceased to exist when we were being chased by the Green fucking Goblin.  
“JJ, what is this?” I ask once we’ve reached the top of the stairs. In the corner, there’s a grey blanket decorated with two drinks, a dozen donuts, and a flower that I can see he clearly stole from Mrs. Aldony’s garden patch.  
“I was thinking about how to repay you for taking care of me the other night.” I turn back around to look at him, and now I understand why he was so flushed downstairs. He takes my hand once again and leads me to the blanket. The sun has just barely begun to rise and I don’t waste another minute.  
“Can you hold the flower?” I ask, pulling my phone out. This is the perfect new ‘dark color palette’ lockscreen I needed. “Cute,” I declare the picture.  
Turning it off, I toss it back down onto the blanket and just take in the sight of JJ in front of me. He’s fidgeting and beaming at the fact that I’m impressed.  
“Have you watched Midnight Gospel yet?”  
“No, I’ve been on neighborhood patrol every night.”  
“Oh yeah, my bad,” I laugh before telling him all about the show. “Well, it started as a podcast and then the dude was like wait I’ll just animate it. So it’s this one character who can visit a variety of worlds and realities, and he’s having these pretty profound conversations with his guests about religion and relationship dynamics, but the catch is the characters have these ordinary conversations in extraordinary situations. Like, the first episode they’re fighting in a zombie apocalypse and… what?” I cut myself off to ask.  
“Nothing.”  
“What is it? Tell me!”  
“You’re cute when you tell me about the shows you like or the latest movie you watched.”  
I suppress a smile, “Oh.”  
“So, it’s a tv show?”  
“Sort of, it’s a Netflix show but it only has one season.”  
JJ attentively keeps asking questions and I continue to tell him about the show and other series I've been watching.  
“So, why are we up at 6?”  
“I have Saturday school.”  
“I see.”  
“Yeah…”  
“You know we could’ve just gotten dinner or something,” I can see the realization flood JJ’s eyes which causes me to burst out in laughter.  
“...We can do that too…” he offers.  
“Oh! Even better! Movie night! Get all the pogues over and we can watch every episode of midnight gospel together!”  
“Hey, it’s your world, I’m just living in it,” he shrugs and takes an unnecessarily large bite of a chocolate covered donut.  
“Saturday school’s over at like 12 right? What are you doing with the rest of your day?”  
Before he can answer, JJ’s phone vibrates. He’s dropped it in water twice, so now the vibration is way louder than normal. He reads the message and quickly clears it from his screen.  
“Hey, so I was thinkin’...” he says looking back up from his phone. “Since we’re boyfriend and girlfriend now, we should go on dates. You know, to practice being a couple so we can really sell it to the pogues.”  
“Sure. It’ would help sell the relationship,” I agree.  
“Yeah…” I’ve been talking the whole time, I just noticed I haven’t had any of my drink.  
“You remembered my drink order,” I say, screaming internally.  
“I’d be a really shitty boyfriend if I didn’t remember,” he shrugs off the gesture, and then hums tiredly. “I should get going.”  
I pick up my phone to look at the time. 7:17.  
“You’re gonna be late.”  
“It’s cool.”  
__________________________  
“What are you doing up? It’s 10 AM on a Saturday,” I hear from my doorway. Mom is standing in my open threshold, somewhat stunned.  
“JJ brought me breakfast before he had to go to Saturday school and I just decided to stay up. How was work?”  
“Are you two a thing yet?” she asks, ignoring my question.  
“What?”  
“You and JJ, have you gone on a date yet?” Am I ready to have this conversation with my mom? Or myself for that matter?  
“Mom, no. It’s not like that we’re just… bros…?”  
“Okay.”  
“Why do you say it like that?” I respond, spinning around in my desk chair to give her my full attention.  
“Because the way JJ looks at you is more than just bros.” Oh.  
“Well... we’re pretending to date in front of the pogues because…” will JJ be safe if I tell mom about the Spiderman thing? What if Goblin bugged my room? I can’t chance it. “Because we just thought it would be funny. And speaking of, the pogues are coming over for movie night if that’s okay?” I plead, hoping she can’t tell I’m lying. Thankfully, she drops it.  
“Yeah, my shift starts at 5 so I’ll be out of your hair before then. Do you guys want to order in? I can leave some cash?”  
“No it’s okay, I can find something here.”  
***


	10. Normalize cuddling the homies!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Previously: After Sarah and John B kept bickering about the inevitable double date they wanted to share with you and JJ, Pope and Kie have hopped on the bandwagon since he asked her to winter formal. The concept of all your friends having relationships leaves you feeling alienated and lonely, until you remember JJ is right there next to you on the sidelines… That is… if the sidelines entails sunrise breakfast dates and romantic evenings to ‘sell the act’.

MESSAGES  
Kie: I’m here

I flop my phone onto the couch hastily and jog over to the front door, swinging it open in excitement. I’m greeted by an equally elated Kie who’s holding two plastic bags full of takeout food. The smell of the bags isn’t strong enough for me to gauge if it’s a good or bad one.  
“You didn’t have to bring anything.”  
“We had tons of leftovers from the lunch rush since people kept leaving after they had ordered,” she approaches my kitchen counter and sets the bags down to search for plates.   
“As long as it wasn’t any trouble… what did you bring us?” I give into my excitement to eat restaurant food. Kie begins showing me the boxed meals that are much fresher than I’d anticipated. Popcorn shrimp, steak fries, dinner rolls, a personal margherita pizza, chicken tenders, and more fries. Her being the first one here, and the fact that I’m the one hosting gives us first pick of all the food, and we are grateful.   
“Sarah says she and John B are heading up now,” Kie says with a mouthful of fries.   
“If dating means always commuting together, where’s Pope?” I tease.  
“Hell if I know, he’s been sporadically answering my texts, so he must be busy with something.”   
A light knock indicates Sarah behind the door and I jog out of the kitchen to answer. She barely greets me before launching into a rant about how women’s pockets don’t exist. John B looks as if he’s heard this rant a million times, but not in an asshole kind of way. He pushes past the two of us once he smells the food, and greets Kie with a geeky handshake. I tune Sarah out unintentionally as I watch him hop up to sit on the counter. John B palms an entire handful of fries, and eats them like a horse before Kie smacks his arm with a towel and tells him to wash his hands.   
“And if men can fit an entire circus in their pockets, we shouldn’t have to worry about our phones falling out! I’ve cracked my phone twice!”  
“Yeah, for sure-” Then, Kie interrupts me.  
“Y/n! Napkins?”   
“Uh, right behind you.”  
“Speaking of circus, where’s JJ?” John B pointedly asks me from behind a bounty paper towel. What happened to the napkins?   
“He had Saturday school, but where he is now I have no idea.”  
“What are we watching?” Sarah steals a popcorn shrimp before settling on my couch.  
“Well, we have options. I was thinking John Wick or Hereditary, but we could also do Fast & Furious 7.”  
“RIP Paul-” John B is interrupted by the front door slamming open, revealing a breathless Pope. JJ is standing behind him suppressing a small fit of laughter. After their grand entry, I shoot JJ a secret look of amused confusion.  
“You good, Pope?” JJ snorts from behind him before ushering the two of them through the threshold. Pope’s trance is broken and he shuffles into my kitchen. Kie offers to fix him a plate since he’s still roughly out of it.  
Watching the events of Pope’s awkwardness transpire, I didn’t notice JJ until he was standing directly in front of me.  
“Come here,” he breathes into the casual chatter of the room. JJ moves to stand behind me before leaning all of his dead weight onto my shoulders.  
“Did you enjoy spending quality time with your boyfriend?” I whisper-laugh as I rest my hands on his, which are draped over my shoulders.  
“Shut up.”  
“Where were y’all?”  
“Mind your business, Y/n.”  
“Yikes, hostile.” Pressing his nose into the bottom of my hairline, he lowers his volume.  
“He’s actually proposing an itinerary for formal.”  
“Oh? Is that something to be so nervous about?”  
“Attention pogues!” Pope calls, perfectly timed to answer my question.  
“Since we’re all doing this formal thing together but not really, and we’re all broke, I propose we have dinner at Ozzy’s beforehand-”  
“Duh-” he ignores me.  
“After that we’ll go straight to the school and once the dance is over, we can go walk to the boardwalk under the moonlight.”  
“That actually sounds like a lot of fun. Good idea Pope,” John B affirms and they begin to discuss hard details for all of us. Meanwhile, JJ and I are lost in our own conversation.  
“He looks like he’s gonna throw up.”  
“He’s definitely nauseous. Look at him.”  
“What did you say to him that’s got him this jittery?”  
“Nothing, I just gave him the rest of my redbull at lunch.” Then, John B interjects.  
“Yo, we’re trying to figure out our plans over here.”  
“Well, figure it out faster!” I push back. “Can I get you anything?”   
“Do you have those Snapple things?” JJ asks as he lifts himself from resting on my shorter frame.  
“Snapple? I have one left.”  
“We still haven’t decided which movie!” Kie yells at me as I enter the kitchen.   
“Get everyone to vote then. Hereditary, John Wick, or Fast & Furious 7?”  
“I haven’t even seen the first one,” Pope says, to which John B responds,  
“Don’t worry about it, they’re all the same.”   
“Sit with me. Girlfriend,” JJ beckons me as I return to the tv area. I join him, but not without making fun of him first.  
“You can still use my name. You know that, right?” Settling into the space between JJ and the arm of the couch, I try to get comfortable but my hips are just too wide for the area.   
“JJ, move over, I can’t fit here,” I half laugh with the Snapple in my right hand. Instead of moving over, JJ hugs his arms around my torso and pulls me down to lay my back against his chest. My opinion on which movie we watch dissolves into nothingness as I think about the way it feels to have him holding onto me so tight. His head is rested on my shoulder, completely framing my body with the outline of his. Why have we never done this before? Normalize cuddling the homies!   
I’m pulled from my thoughts by the sound of Sarah’s smug laughter. JJ and I both tense a little bit.  
“...What?” I ask, not sure if I want the actual answer, and afraid it’ll ruin the comfort I’d felt moments before. Turns out what she’s about to say is absolutely worth the interruption.  
“JJ are you going to ask Y/n to formal?”   
“Yes JJ. Are you going to ask me to formal?” I tease, turning my head to the side and using my peripheral to see his nervous expression.  
“I asked you this morning…?” He says as more of a question than a statement. Naturally, this caught me off guard.  
“That was you asking?” I test the waters.  
“...No it was not…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is SUPER short and I’m sorry it took forever. I’m back in school so my time is not as free, but I promise I’m pushing through for y’all! This part is mega short but it’s heading towards JUICY content and I’m excited for what’s to come y’all aren’t even ready for this one!


	11. Holy Classroom

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously: Kie made it over for movie night on time, unlike the rest of the pogues. Once JJ and Pope arrive, Pope brings up plans for the evening of winter formal. The issue is a hot topic now that the pogues are all ‘official’... sort of. JJ realizes the rooftop breakfast wasn’t direct enough, and now he must find a formal proposal worthy of your love.

Monday morning has finally arrived and I do not wish to be perceived. I feel a lump settling in my throat and warm tears quiver on my lower lash line. Today is already horrible.  
As I set foot past the front gate of school, I see JJ’s face and I nearly break down sobbing. I’m not sad, they’re not sad tears. It’s anger and frustration and rage.  
“Hey-”  
“I am already having the worst day ever and it’s like 8 AM-” I interrupt before JJ can fully greet me, but I’ve finished as soon as I’ve started because my voice is buckling underneath my emotions. The first bell rings and I then realize just how late I really am.  
“What’s wrong?”   
“I’m so fucking done. I made breakfast and then I dropped my breakfast on my shirt so I couldn’t eat it anymore. Then, I lost track of time trying to clean my shirt so I didn’t have anything quick to grab and eat so I don’t even have lunch I can dip into. Even though I didn’t take any time to pack a meal I’m still much later than normal. I didn’t do my packet for history because I fell asleep early last night and it’s a 50/50 for whether or not my teacher’s gonna be forgiving. I’m just a total mess right now and I wanna cry so bad but I refuse to cry in school so now I can’t talk to anyone today or I’ll just start crying.”  
“I’m sorry, kiddo-”  
“And! Oohhoohoh AND I stepped in a fucking puddle and my sock is soaking wet and now my foot is cold and I have to sit in class with a wet sock!” The puddle was really the icing on the disaster cake. I can’t give into my desires completely so once a few tears begin to track down my face, I wipe them off quickly and sniffle back a sob.  
“Hey.” As we approach my first period classroom, JJ pulls me into the tightest hug. But he doesn’t let go after a few seconds like he normally does. We stand to the side of the hallway, and everything else ceases to exist. JJ’s breathing begins to sync with mine, and I can clearly hear his heartbeat from my place on his chest. I hope and pray no one is staring at us, but I can’t be bothered to genuinely check. I know JJ wouldn’t let that happen. He nearly decked a kid for calling me weird back in Sophomore year.  
Pulling me away from his embrace, JJ searches my face for anymore distress, but once he sees I’ve calmed down, he reaches down and takes my hand.   
“Come on, I know how you hate being late to class,” he offers a gentle, closed-mouth smile in hopes that I’ll absorb his good vibes.   
“Thank you for listening. You’re…” I hesitate, searching for the right words to say. “-such a good best friend.” JJ’s smile doesn’t move.  
“You know I love you, Y/n.”  
“Yeah, I do.”  
“You better go though, you don’t wanna be late to class.”  
“Thank you, JJ.” I only just now notice he’s wearing a baseball cap, and I don’t suppress the urge to flick the brim. He laughs and then rotates the hat to wear it backwards. Behind the adjustable strap, I see a small scab resting in his golden hairline.   
“Was that your dad or Spidey?” I ask in a hushed voice of concern.  
“Uh, the bell’s about to ring, so you should sit down so your teacher doesn’t mark you late?” he says as more of a question than a statement. I decide not to push it. “See you after class?”   
“Okay.” And with that, JJ heads for his own first period as I enter mine. Mrs. Kasmos is giving me a look.   
“Mrs. Kasmos I have had the worst morning ever and I’m on the verge of a mental breakdown.”  
“I’m sorry to hear that.”  
“We don’t have a lecture today in precalc. Can I come sit in here where it’s quiet and work on homework?”  
“For sure, as long as it's okay with your teacher.”   
__________________________  
Trudging through my next few classes, I practically cry of relief when my teacher lets me go to sit in Kasmos’s room.   
“Hey, Y/n. I’m not legally supposed to do this but I trust you, so I’m gonna run to the bathroom. Don’t let the room burn down.”  
“No promises.”  
As shitty as my morning was, I thank past Y/n for grabbing my laptop last minute. I should be writing a history paper, but instead, I open the editing bay where I’m piecing together my documentary of JJ. This was the day I had my good camera on me, so the shots are super high quality compared to the home-video esque ones I was editing before. Should I add music? No, I need this to be copyright free if I want to use it for festivals.  
“Y/n,” I hear a stage whisper from my left.  
“What are you doing here?” I scold when I see JJ’s the one calling for my attention.   
“I saw you left math, and so I asked to go to the bathroom.”  
“To follow me?”  
“Yeah?”  
“You’re such an idiot.” JJ enters the classroom very comfortably for someone who’s never had Mrs. Kasmos.  
“So, I was thinking.”  
“Oh good for you.”  
“Shut up. I was thinking that maybe we should go on a date Friday.”  
“We should?”  
“Do you want to go on a date Friday?” he asks directly, resting against the table top next to my computer. JJ scratches along the hairline on his neck before readjusting his hat, a nervous habit I’ve picked up on over the course of our friendship.  
“You mean, like, as an alibi for the other pogues...?”   
“...Yeah,” he sighs deeply, “To sell the act for the other pogues.”  
“Sure.”  
“Good. Because, I do too.”  
“Okay, JJ,” I say through a small laugh before removing the earbud from my left ear. “Is that all you need from me?”   
“Yeah, that’s all I wanted to tell you.” He then takes the chair next to mine, and flips it around so he’s straddling the seat and resting his crossed arms on the chair back. “What are you working on?”  
“My documentary for film, and hopefully festivals eventually.”  
“Hey, that’s me!”  
“It’s about you, you dork.” JJ smiles before playfully trying to push me out of my seat. After I regain my balance, JJ’s staring at me with a fond smile. Our laughter falls to silence as his eyes study mine, and I teasingly glare at him. The well of wonder in his eyes is captivating enough, I could stare for hours and never get bored. I want to commit every feature to memory, even the scabs and the scars.  
“Oh fuck!” His exclamation breaks me from my trance. “I’ve got Spidey shit Friday!”  
“Oh.”  
“We should just hang out tonight.”  
“Tonight? You want to go on a full-on date on a school night?”  
“Well, when’s that ever stopped us?”  
“...I guess you’re right.”  
“I know I’m right.”  
“Shut up you hoe.”  
“How dare you call me a hoe in Kasmos’s holy classroom!” JJ widens his eyes and holds both arms out to his sides with his palms flexed. He looks around, as if to ensure the sanctity of the room is intact. “I’ll swing by at 5?”  
“Literally swing by?”  
“Ha ha,” he deadpans with contempt.  
“You should go back to class, you’re gonna be marked truant!”  
“Fine!” He groans like a five year old before literally jumping off of his seat. And with the back of his hand splayed across his forehead, like a damsel in distress, he says, “Since you hate me so much, I’ll return to remedial U.S. History.”  
“You’re such an idiot.” JJ begins to walk toward the doorway, backwards.  
“Catch you next period, princess!” Then, after he’s reached the threshold, Mrs. Kasmos rounds the corner to see him leaving.   
“Morning, Mrs. K. You should write Y/n up for a referral, she tried to hack into your email before I caught her.”  
“I did not!” I laugh as he shoots her a look of concern and mouths ‘she did’.


End file.
